Louis II died in 1417 and his sons, together with their brother-in-law Charles, were brought up under the guardianship of their mother, the elder son, Louis III, succeeded to the crown of Sicily and the Duchy of Anjou, René being known as the Count of Guise. In 1419, by his marriage treaty with Isabella, elder daughter of Charles II, Duke of Lorraine, René became heir to the Duchy of Bar, which was claimed as the inheritance of his mother Yolande, and, by right of his wife, heir to the Duchy of Lorraine.[2]

René, then only ten, was to be brought up in Lorraine under the guardianship of Charles II and Louis, cardinal of Bar,[3] both of whom were attached to the Burgundian party, but he retained the right to bear the arms of Anjou. He was far from sympathizing with the Burgundians. Joining the French army at Reims in 1429, he was present at the consecration of Charles VII. When Louis of Bar died in 1430, René came into sole possession of his duchy, the next year, on his father-in-law's death, he succeeded to the duchy of Lorraine. The inheritance was contested by the heir-male, Antoine de Vaudemont, who with Burgundian help defeated René at Bulgneville in July 1431,[4] the Duchess Isabella effected a truce with Antoine, but the duke remained a prisoner of the Burgundians until April 1432, when he recovered his liberty on parole on yielding up as hostages his two sons, John and Louis.[2]

René's title as duke of Lorraine was confirmed by his suzerain, Emperor Sigismund, at Basel in 1434. This proceeding roused the anger of the Burgundian duke, Philip the Good, who required him early in the next year to return to his prison, from which he was released two years later on payment of a heavy ransom, at the death of his brother Louis III in 1435, he succeeded to the Duchy of Anjou and County of Maine. Joanna II, queen of Naples, had adopted Louis III in 1431 and now offered to permit René to inherit her kingdom in his place. The marriage of Marie of Bourbon, niece of Philip of Burgundy, with John, Duke of Cambria, René's eldest son, cemented peace between the two princes, after appointing a regency in Bar and Lorraine, he visited his provinces of Anjou and Provence, and in 1438 set sail for Naples, which had been held for him by his wife, the Duchess Isabel.[2]

The castle of Baugé, home castle of René, Duke of Anjou, in the village of Baugé, Maine-et-Loire, France.

René, as a vassal, paying homage to the King of France.

The court of honour in the chateau at Tarascon, Provence, with vestiges of the busts of René and Jeanne de Laval on the right

René of Naples with his army.

René's captivity, and the poverty of the Angevin resources due to his ransom, enabled Alfonso V of Aragon, who had been first adopted and then repudiated by Joanna II, to make some headway in the kingdom of Naples, especially as he was already in possession of the island of Sicily; in 1441 Alfonso laid siege to Naples, which he sacked after a six-month siege. René returned to France in the same year, and though he retained the title of king of Naples his effective rule was never recovered.[3] Later efforts to recover his rights in Italy failed, his mother Yolande, who had governed Anjou in his absence, died in 1442.[2]

René now made over the government of Lorraine to his son John, who was, however, only formally installed as Duke of Lorraine on the death of Queen Isabella in 1453. René had the confidence of Charles VII, and is said to have initiated the reduction of the men-at-arms set on foot by the king, with whose military operations against the English he was closely associated, he entered Rouen with him in November 1449, and was also with him at Formigny and Caen.[5]

After his second marriage with Jeanne de Laval, daughter of Guy of Laval and Isabella of Brittany,[5] René took a less active part in public affairs, devoting himself to composing poetry and painting miniatures, gardening and raising animals,[3] the fortunes of his house declined in his old age: in 1466, the rebellious Catalans offered the crown of Aragon to René. His son John, unsuccessful in Italy, was sent to take up the conquest of that kingdom but died—apparently by poison—at Barcelona on 16 December 1470.[5] John's eldest son Nicholas perished in 1473, also under suspicion of poisoning; in 1471, René's daughter Margaret was finally defeated in the Wars of the Roses. Her husband and her son were killed and she herself became a prisoner who had to be ransomed by Louis XI in 1476.[5]

René retired to Provence[3] and in 1474 made a will by which he left Bar to his grandson René II, Duke of Lorraine; Anjou and Provence to his nephew Charles, count of Le Maine. King Louis XI seized Anjou and Bar, and two years later sought to compel René to exchange the two duchies for a pension, the offer was rejected, but further negotiations assured the lapse to the crown of the duchy of Anjou and the annexation of Provence was only postponed until the death of the Count of Le Maine. René died on 10 July 1480 at Aix, he was buried in the cathedral of Angers.[6] In the 19th century, historians bestowed on him the epithet "the good".[7]

He founded an order of chivalry, the Ordre du Croissant, which preceded the royal foundation of St Michael but did not survive René.[6]

Side panels of the Burning Bush triptych, showing René and his second wife, Jeanne de Laval.

Miniature by or after Barthélemy d'Eyck from Le Livre du Cuer d'amours espris depicting Love giving Desire to the heart of the ailing king

The King of Sicily's fame as an amateur painter[a] formerly led to the optimistic attribution to him of many paintings in Anjou and Provence, in many cases simply because they bore his arms, these works are generally in the Early Netherlandish style, and were probably executed under his patronage and direction, so that he may be said to have formed a school of the fine arts in sculpture, painting, goldsmith's work and tapestry.[6] He employed Barthélemy d'Eyck as both painter and varlet de chambre for most of his career.[citation needed]

He exchanged verses with his kinsman, the poet Charles of Orléans.[6] René was also the author of two allegorical works: a devotional dialogue, Le Mortifiement de vaine plaisance (The Mortification of Vain Pleasure, 1455), and a love quest, Le Livre du Cuer d'amours espris (The Book of the Love-Smitten Heart, 1457). The latter fuses the conventions of Arthurian romance with an allegory of love based on the Romance of the Rose. Both works were exquisitely illustrated by his court painter, Barthélémy d'Eyck. Le Mortifiement survives in eight illuminated manuscripts. Although Barthélémy's original is lost, the extant manuscripts include copies of his miniatures by Jean le Tavernier, Jean Colombe, and others. René is sometimes credited with the pastoral poem "Regnault and Jeanneton",[b] but this was more likely a gift to the king honoring his marriage to Jeanne de Laval.[citation needed]

King René's Tournament Book (Le Livre des tournois or Traicte de la Forme de Devis d'un Tournoi; c. 1460) describes rules of a tournament. The most famous and earliest of the many manuscript copies[10] is kept in the French National Library, this is—unusually for a deluxe manuscript—on paper and painted in watercolor. It may represent drawings by Barthélemy d'Eyck, intended as preparatory only, which were later illuminated by him or another artist. There are twenty-six full and double page miniatures, the description given in the book is different from that of the pas d'armes held at Razilly and Saumur; conspicuously absent are the allegorical and chivalresque ornamentations that were in vogue at the time. René instead emphasizes he is reporting on ancient tournament customs of France, Germany and the Low Countries, combining them in a new suggestion on how to hold a tournament, the tournament described is a melee fought by two sides. Individual jousts are only briefly mentioned.[citation needed]

Jeanne de Laval, on 10 September 1454, at the Abbey of St. Nicholas in Angers

His legitimate children by Isabelle were:

John II (2 August 1424 – 16 December 1470), Duke of Lorraine and King of Naples, married Marie de Bourbon, daughter of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon, by whom he had issue. He also had several illegitimate children.

Louis (16 October 1427 – between 22 May and 16 October 1444), Marquis of Pont-à-Mousson and Lieutenant General of Lorraine. At the age of five, in 1432, he was sent as a hostage to Dijon with his brother John in exchange for their captive father. John was released, but Louis was not and died of pneumonia in prison.

Nicholas (2 November 1428 – 1430), twin with Yolande.

Yolande (2 November 1428 – 23 March 1483), married Frederick of Lorraine, count of Vaudemont; mother, among others, of Duke René II of Lorraine.

King René's Honeymoon, 1864, an imaginary scene in the life of the king by Ford Madox Brown.

He appears as "Reignier" in William Shakespeare's play Henry VI, part 1, his alleged poverty for a king is satirised. He pretends to be the Dauphin to deceive Joan of Arc, but she sees through him, she later claims to be pregnant with his child.

René and his Order of the Crescent were adopted as "historical founders" by the Lambda Chi Alpha Fraternity in 1912, as exemplars of Christian chivalry and charity. Ceremonies of the Order of the Crescent were referenced in formulating ceremonies for the fraternity.

Chant du Roi René (Song of King René) is a piece for organ (or harmonium) by Alexandre Guilmant (1837–1911) from his collection of Noels (Op.60). The theme used throughout this piece was alleged to have been written by René (Guilmant's source was Alphonse Pellet, organist at Nîmes Cathedral).

René frequently changed his coat of arms, which represented his numerous and fluctuating claims to titles, both actual and nominal, the Coat of arms of René in 1420; Composing the arms of the House of Valois-Anjou (top left and bottom right), Duchy of Bar (top right and bottom left), and of the Duchy of Lorraine (superimposed shield). In 1434 were added Hungary, Kingdom of Naples and Jerusalem, the arms of the Crown of Aragon were shown from 1443 to 1470. In 1453 the arms of Lorraine were removed and in 1470 Valois-Anjou were substituted for the modern arms of the duchy (superimposed shield).

^A letter from the Neapolitan humanistPietro Summonte to Marcantonio Michiel, of 20 March 1524, reporting on the state of art in Naples, and works there by Netherlandish painters, states that "King René was also a skilled painter and was very keen on the study of the discipline, but according to the style of Flanders". The letter was published by Niccolini[8] in 1925 and translated by Richardson & al.[9] in 2007.

^As, for instance, by the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica.[5]

1.
Nicolas Froment
–
Nicolas Froment was a French painter of the Early Renaissance. He was influenced by the Flemish style that characterizes the last phase of the Gothic and he was attributed a number of works from this timetime, but none of these attributions can be considered reliable. The Resurrection of Lazarus, triptych, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, the Matheron Diptych, oil on canvas,17 x 26 cm, Paris, Musée du Louvre. Le Buisson ardent, triptych, tempera on wood,410 x 305 cm, Aix-en-Provence, the Legend of Saint Mitre, oil on wood, Aix-en-Provence, cathédrale Saint-Sauveur

2.
King of Naples
–
The following is a list of rulers of the Kingdom of Naples, from its first separation from the Kingdom of Sicily to its merger with the same into the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. In 1382, the Kingdom of Naples was heired by Charles III, after this, the House of Anjou of Naples was renamed House of Anjou-Durazzo, like Charles III married his first cousin Margaret of Durazzo, member of a prominent Neapolitan noble family. Naples became a union of the Kingdom of France, under Louis XII. The local government was ruled by a French viceroy, Naples became a personal union of the Kingdom of Aragon, under Ferdinand II. The local government was ruled by a Spanish viceroy, the royal houses were, House of Trastámara House of Habsburg Officially a Republic, Naples was governed for a short time by the Duke of Guise, under the title of Doge of Naples. Naples returned a personal union of the Kingdom of Spain, under Philip IV, the local government was ruled by a Spanish viceroy

3.
Joanna II of Naples
–
Joanna II was Queen of Naples from 1414 to her death, upon which the senior Angevin line of Naples became extinct. As a mere formality, she used the title of Queen of Jerusalem, Sicily, Joanna was born at Zara, Dalmatia on 25 June 1373, as the daughter of Charles III of Naples and Margaret of Durazzo. In 1414, she succeeded her brother Ladislaus to the throne of Naples, at that date she was 41 years old and was already the widow of her cousin Hedwigs rejected fiancé, William and she married twice, but had no children. Joanna married her first husband, William, Duke of Austria in Vienna in the autumn of 1401 when she was 28 years of age and he had been rejected as a husband by her cousin, Hedwig of Poland. Joanna did not have any children by William, who died in 1406 after five years of marriage and it was sometime after his death, that she acquired a lover by the name of Pandolfello Alopo, whom she appointed Grand Chamberlain. Alopo was the first in what would become a series of lovers and he later caused the downfall of the influential condottiero and grand constable Muzio Sforza, provoking much jealousy. In early 1415, she became fiancee to John of Aragon, a son of King Ferdinand I of Aragon, the betrothal was annulled shortly after, which left Joanna free to choose another husband. On 10 August 1415, she married a second time, to James of Bourbon, Count of La Marche, the marriage contract stipulated that upon his marriage to Joanna, James would be granted the title of Prince of Taranto. Not having received the title, he had Alopo killed and forced Joanna to name him King of Naples. In an attempt to complete power, James imprisoned Joanna in her own apartments in the royal palace, however. In 1416, a riot exploded in Naples, and James was compelled to back his French administrators. In this period, Joanna began her relationship with Sergianni Caracciolo, on 28 August 1417, she reconquered Rome, and the following year, James left Naples for France. With James now powerless, Joanna could finally celebrate her coronation on 28 October 1419, however, her relationship with Naples nominal feudal suzerain, Pope Martin V, soon worsened. Upon the advice of Caracciolo, she denied Martin economic aid to rebuild the papal army, in response, the Pope called in Louis III of Anjou, son of the rival of King Ladislaus and himself still a pretender to the Neapolitan throne. In 1420, Louis invaded Campania, but the Pope, trying to gain advantage from the menace posed to Joanna. Joanna rejected the ambiguous papal proposal calling for help from the brother of her erstwhile betrothed, Alfonso entered Naples in July 1421. Louis lost the support of the Pope, but at the time the relationship between Joanna and Alfonso worsened. In May 1423, Alfonso had Caracciolo arrested and besieged Joannas residence, an agreement was obtained, Sergianni was freed, and fled to Aversa with Joanna

4.
Alfonso V of Aragon
–
Alfonso the Magnanimous KG was the King of Aragon, Valencia, Majorca, Sardinia and Corsica, Sicily and Count of Barcelona from 1416, and King of Naples from 1442 until his death. He was one of the most prominent figures of the early Renaissance, born at Medina del Campo, he was the son of Ferdinand I of Aragon and Eleanor of Alburquerque. He represented the old line of the counts of Barcelona through the line, and was on his fathers side descended from the House of Trastamara. By hereditary right he was king of Sicily and claimed the island of Sardinia for himself, Alfonso was also in possession of much of Corsica by the 1420s. In 1421 the childless Queen Joanna II of Naples adopted and named him as heir to the Kingdom of Naples, and Alfonso went to Naples. Here he hired the condottiero Braccio da Montone with the task of reducing the resistance of his rival claimant, Louis III of Anjou, with Pope Martin V supporting Sforza, Alfonso switched his religious allegiance to the Aragonese antipope Benedict XIII. After an attempt to arrest the queen herself had failed, Joan called on Sforza who defeated the Aragonese militias near Castel Capuano in Naples, Alfonso fled to Castel Nuovo, but the help of a fleet of 22 galleys led by Giovanni da Cardona improved his situation. Sforza and Joanna ransomed Caracciolo and retreated to the fortress of Aversa, here she repudiated her earlier adoption of Alfonso and, with the backing of Martin V, named Louis III as her heir instead. The Duke of Milan, Filippo Maria Visconti, joined the anti-Aragonese coalition, on his way towards Barcelona, Alfonso destroyed Marseille, a possession of Louis III. In late 1423 the Genoese fleet of Filippo Maria Visconti moved in the southern Tyrrhenian Sea, rapidly conquering Gaeta, Procida, Castellammare and Sorrento. Naples, which was held by Alfonsos brother, Pedro de Aragon, was besieged in 1424 by the Genoese ships and Joannas troops, now led by Francesco Sforza, the city fell in April 1424. Pedro, after a resistance in Castel Nuovo, fled to Sicily in August. Joanna II and Louis III again took possession of the realm, an opportunity for Alfonso to reconquer Naples occurred in 1432, when Caracciolo was killed in a conspiracy. Alfonso tried to regain the favour of the queen, but failed, in her will, she bequeathed her realm to René of Anjou, Louis IIIs younger brother. This solution was opposed by the new pope, Eugene IV, the Neapolitans having called in the French, Alfonso decided to intervene and, with the support of several barons of the kingdom, captured Capua and besieged the important sea fortress of Gaeta. His fleet of 25 galleys was met by the Genoese ships sent by Visconti, in the battle of Ponza that ensued, Alfonso was defeated and taken prisoner. Helped by a Sicilian fleet, Alfonso recaptured Capua and set his base in Gaeta in February 1436, meanwhile, papal troops had invaded the Neapolitan kingdom, but Alfonso bribed their commander, Cardinal Giovanni Vitelleschi, and their successes waned. In the meantime, René had managed to reach Naples on 19 May 1438, Alfonso tried to besiege the city in the following September, but failed

5.
Counts and dukes of Anjou
–
The Count of Anjou was the ruler of the county of Anjou, first granted by Charles the Bald in the 9th century to Robert the Strong. Ingelger and his son were viscounts of Angers until Ingelgers son Fulk the Red assumed the title of Count of Anjou, Ingelgers male line ended with Geoffrey II, Count of Anjou. Subsequent counts of Anjou were descended from Geoffreys sister Ermengarde of Anjou and Geoffrey II and their agnatic descendants, who included the Angevin kings of England, continued to hold these titles and property until the French monarchy gained control of the area. Thereafter the titles Count of Anjou and, after 1360, Duke of Anjou were granted several times, usually to members of the French ruling houses of Valois and Bourbon. The title was held by Philippe, a grandson of King Louis XIV, since then, some Spanish legitimist claimants to the French throne have borne the title even to the present day, as does a nephew of the Orléanist pretender. In 1204, Anjou was lost to king Philip II of France and it was re-granted as an appanage for Louis VIIIs son John, who died in 1232 at the age of thirteen, and then to Louiss youngest son, Charles, later the first Angevin king of Sicily. In 1290, Margaret married Charles of Valois, the brother of king Philip IV of France. He became Count of Anjou in her right, in 1328, Philip of Valois ascended the French throne and became King Philip VI. At this time, the counties of Anjou, Maine, on 26 April 1332, Philip granted the county to his eldest son, John, Following Johns ascension to the throne as John II in 1350, the title once again reverted to the royal domain. The dukes contributed greatly to social reform in the 1300s and 1400s, on the death of Charles IV, Anjou returned to the royal domain. After the death of Henry, Count of Chambord, only the descendants of Philip V of Spain remained of the line of Louis XIV. The most senior of these, the Carlist claimant to the Spanish throne, some of them used the courtesy title of Duke of Anjou. At the death of Alfonso Carlos in 1936, the Capetian seniority passed to the exiled King of Spain, Alfonso XIII. In 1941, Infante Jaime, Duke of Segovia, succeeded his father Alfonso XIII as the male of Louis XIV. He then adopted the title of Duke of Anjou, on December 8,2004, Henry, Count of Paris, Duke of France, Orléanist Pretender to the French throne, granted his nephew Charles Philippe the title of Duke of Anjou. For him, the title was available since 1824, because he doesnt recognize his cousins courtesy title, list of Countesses and Duchesses of Anjou Anjou Titles of the counts and dukes of Anjou in the 11-16th centuries from contemporary documents with bibliography

6.
Count of Provence
–
The land of Provence has a history quite separate from that of any of the larger nations of Europe. Its independent existence has its origins in the nature of the dukedom in Merovingian Gaul. Provence was eventually joined to the other Burgundian kingdom, but it remained ruled by its own powerful, in the eleventh century, Provence became disputed between the traditional line and the counts of Toulouse, who claimed the title of Margrave of Provence. In the High Middle Ages, the title of Count of Provence belonged to families of Frankish origin, to the House of Barcelona, to the House of Anjou. After 1032, the county was part of the Holy Roman Empire and it was inherited by King Louis XI of France in 1481, and definitively incorporated into the French royal domain by his son Charles VIII in 1484. Provence was usually a part of the division of the Frankish realm known as Kingdom of Burgundy and their title sometimes appears as rector Provinciae. This is an incomplete list of the known Merovingian-appointed dukes of Provence, out of this division came the Kingdom of Provence, given to Lothairs youngest son, Charles. A heritage of royal rule was thus inaugurated in Provence that, though it was subsumed into one of its larger neighbouring kingdoms. The kingdom of Provence was also known as Lower Burgundy and its capital was first Vienne then Arles and it is therefore sometimes known as Arelate. Charles Provence divided between surviving brothers, Lothair II and the Emperor Louis II, Louis II, also Holy Roman Emperor from 855 As with his Kingdom of Italy, Louiss Provence goes to his uncle on his death. Charles the Bald, also Holy Roman Emperor from 875 Louis the Stammerer With the death of Louis, Charles successor, boso married Ermengard, daughter of Louis II, to strengthen his and his sons claim. Hugh never used the title in Provence. Hugh In 933, Provence ceases to be a kingdom as Hugh exchanged it with Rudolph II of Upper Burgundy for the Iron Crown of Lombardy. It was in the aftermath of the death of Louis the Blind that Provence began to be ruled by local counts placed under the authority of a margrave, firstly, Hugh of Arles served as duke and regent during Louis long blindness. Secondly, Hugh gave the march of Vienne and duchy of Provence to Rudolf II of Burgundy in a treaty of 933, Rudolf was never recognised by the nobles of the country and instead appointed Hugh, Duke of Burgundy, its first margrave. At the time, the counts in the region were the counts of Arles. Those who would first bear the title comes Provinciae or count of Provence descended from one Rotbold of Arles, William I and Rotbold I did not divide their fathers domains and this indivisibility was maintained by their respective descendants. It is thus impossible to ascertain who succeeded whom in the county as various reigns overlap, the margravial title also continued in their family until it passed to Bertrand, Count of Toulouse in 1062

7.
Louis III of Naples
–
Louis III was titular King of Naples from 1417 to 1426, Count of Provence, Forcalquier, Piedmont, and Maine and Duke of Anjou from 1417 to 1434, and Duke of Calabria from 1426 to 1434. He was the eldest son and heir of Louis II of Anjou, the throne of Aragon fell vacant in 1410 when king Martin I of Aragon died. Louis mother Yolande was the daughter of sonless King John I of Aragon. They claimed the throne of Aragon for the young Louis, however, unclear though they were, the succession rules of Aragon and Barcelona at that time were understood to favor all male relatives before any female. Martin died without surviving issue in 1410, and after two years without a king, the Estates of Aragon by Compromise of Caspe in 1412 elected Infante Ferdinand of Castile as the next King of Aragon. Ferdinand was the son of Eleanor of Aragon and John I of Castile. The family however had secured some Aragonese lands in Montpellier and Roussillon, Yolande and her sons regarded themselves as heirs of higher claim and began to use the title of Kings of Aragon. From this inheritance forward, Louis and Yolande were called the King and Queen of Four Kingdoms, those four being Sicily, Jerusalem, Aragon, of those, only the mainland part of Sicily was ever directly held by Louis, and only briefly. Louis also had claims on the title Latin Emperor, which his grandfather Louis I had purchased in 1383, Pope Martin V invested Louis III on 4 December 1419 as King of Sicily. This was in contrast with the will of the childless and aged queen of the Italian kingdom, Joanna II, in 1420 Louis disembarked in Campania and besieged Naples, but had to flee at the arrive of an Aragonese fleet. Alfonso entered the city in 1421 and Louis lost the support of the Pope, however, when the relationships between Alfonso and queen suddenly worsened after the arrest of Joannas lover and prime minister, Gianni Caracciolo, the queen moved to Aversa where Louis joined her. He was adopted and named heir in lieu of Alfonso, giving him the title of Duke of Calabria, when Alfonso had to return to Aragon, the kingdom was pacified. Louis moved to his possession in Calabria, where he lived with Margaret of Savoy, daughter of Amadeus VIII. Louis could never become king effectively, as he died of malaria at Cosenza in 1434, after Joannas death the following year, his brother René of Anjou was named King of Naples. The Good King, René of Anjou and Fifteenth Century Europe, amedeo Miceli di Serradileo, Una dichiarazione di Luigi III dAngiò dalla città di San Marco, Archivio Storico per la Calabria e la Lucania, Rome, XLIII,1976, pp. 69–83

8.
Charles IV, Duke of Anjou
–
He succeeded his father as Count of Maine, Guise, Mortain and Gien in 1472. He succeeded his uncle René I of Naples in 1480 as fifth Duke of Anjou and Count of Provence, renés surviving daughter Yolande received Bar and was already Duchess of Lorraine. He also used the title of Duke of Calabria, in token of the claims to Naples he inherited from René, in 1474 he married Joan of Lorraine, daughter of Frederick II of Vaudémont, but they had no children. He died on 10 December 1481 and he willed his inheritance to his cousin Louis XI of France, whose heirs thus obtained a claim to the affairs of Italy, pursued in the next decades. Medieval European Coinage, Volume 14, South Italy, Sicily, Counts and Dukes of Anjou Counts and Dukes of Maine Counts of Provence Dukes of Guise

9.
Angers
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Angers is a city in western France, about 300 km southwest of Paris. It is chef-lieu of the Maine-et-Loire department and was, before the French Revolution, the inhabitants of both the city and the province are called Angevins. The commune of Angers proper, without the area, is the third most populous in northwestern France after Nantes and Rennes. Angers is the capital of Anjou and was for centuries an important stronghold in northwestern France. It is the cradle of the Plantagenet dynasty and was during the reign of René of Anjou one of the centers of Europe. Angers developed at the confluence of three rivers, the Mayenne, the Sarthe, and the Loir, all coming from the north and their confluence, just north of Angers, creates the Maine, a short but wide river that flows into the Loire several kilometers south. The Angers metropolitan area is an economic center in western France, particularly active in the industrial sector, horticulture. Angers proper covers 42.70 square kilometers and has a population of 147,305 inhabitants, the Angers Loire Métropole is made up of 33 communes covering 540 square kilometers with 287,000 inhabitants. Angers enjoys a cultural life, made possible by its universities. The old medieval center is dominated by the massive château of the Plantagenêts, home of the Apocalypse Tapestry. Angers is also both at the edge of the Val de Loire, a World Heritage Site, and the Loire-Anjou-Touraine regional natural park, the city is first mentioned by Ptolemy around AD150 in his Geography. It was then known as Juliomagus, a name by which it appears in the Tabula Peutingeriana. The name is a compound of the Latin name Julius and the Celtic magos, similar town dedications were common in Roman Gaul, and toponyms often kept a Gallic element. When the location needed to be distinguished from other Juliomagi, it was known as Juliomagus Andecavorum, in reference to the principal Gallic tribe in, around AD400, the city came to be referred to as the civitas Andecavorum. This was a change in Gaul, also seen in the names of Paris, Tours. During the Middle Ages, the late Latin name gradually developed into the modern one and it is successively mentioned as Andecava civitas, Andecavis, Andegavis, Angieus and Angeus. The form Angiers appeared during the 12th century and was corrupted to Angers. The Latin Andecavum gave also Anjou its name and this double formation is quite common in France and is also seen in Poitiers & Poitou and Bourges & Berry

10.
Anjou
–
Anjou is an historical and cultural region of France, a former French county, duchy, and province. Its capital was the city of Angers in the lower Loire Valley, the territory has no very clear geographical borders but instead owes its territory and prominence to the fortunes of its various rulers. Henry Curtmantle, count of Anjou, inherited the kingdom of England on October 25,1154, the resulting Angevin Empire would, at its peak, spread from Ulster to the Pyrenees. Count Arthur was taken prisoner by his uncle the king in 1203, in 1205, the county was seized by Philip II Augustus of France. Its status was elevated to that of a duchy for Prince Louis, Anjou corresponds largely to the present-day department of Maine-et-Loire. It occupied the part of what is now the department of Maine-et-Loire. Anjous political origin is traced to the ancient Gallic state of the Andes, after the conquest by Julius Caesar, the area was organized around the Roman civitas of the Andecavi. The Roman civitas was afterward preserved as a district under the Franks with the name first of pagus—then of comitatus or countship—of Anjou. At the beginning of the reign of Charles the Bald, the integrity of Anjou was seriously menaced by a danger, from Brittany to the west. Lambert, a count of Nantes, devastated Anjou in concert with Nominoé. By the end of the year 851, he had succeeded in occupying all the part as far as the Mayenne. The principality which he carved out for himself was occupied on his death by Erispoé. By him, it was handed down to his successors, in whose hands it remained until the beginning of the 10th century, the Normans raided the country continuously as well. A brave man was needed to defend it, the chroniclers of Anjou named a Tertullus as the first count, elevated from obscurity by Charles the Bald. A figure by that name seems to have been the father of the later count Ingelger but his dynasty seems to have preceded by Robert the Strong. Robert met his death in 866 in a battle at Brissarthe against the Normans, hugh the Abbot succeeded him in the countship of Anjou as in most of his other duties, on his death in 886, it passed to Odo, Roberts eldest son. His descendants continued to bear that rank for three centuries and he was succeeded by his son Fulk II the Good, author of the proverb that an unlettered king is a wise ass, in 938. He was succeeded in turn by his son Geoffrey I Grisegonelle around 958, Geoffrey Greytunic succeeded in making the Count of Nantes his vassal and in obtaining from the Duke of Aquitaine the concession in fief of the district of Loudun

11.
Kingdom of France
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The Kingdom of France was a medieval and early modern monarchy in Western Europe. It was one of the most powerful states in Europe and a great power since the Late Middle Ages and it was also an early colonial power, with possessions around the world. France originated as West Francia, the half of the Carolingian Empire. A branch of the Carolingian dynasty continued to rule until 987, the territory remained known as Francia and its ruler as rex Francorum well into the High Middle Ages. The first king calling himself Roi de France was Philip II, France continued to be ruled by the Capetians and their cadet lines—the Valois and Bourbon—until the monarchy was overthrown in 1792 during the French Revolution. France in the Middle Ages was a de-centralised, feudal monarchy, in Brittany and Catalonia the authority of the French king was barely felt. Lorraine and Provence were states of the Holy Roman Empire and not yet a part of France, during the Late Middle Ages, the Kings of England laid claim to the French throne, resulting in a series of conflicts known as the Hundred Years War. Subsequently, France sought to extend its influence into Italy, but was defeated by Spain in the ensuing Italian Wars, religiously France became divided between the Catholic majority and a Protestant minority, the Huguenots, which led to a series of civil wars, the Wars of Religion. France laid claim to large stretches of North America, known collectively as New France, Wars with Great Britain led to the loss of much of this territory by 1763. French intervention in the American Revolutionary War helped secure the independence of the new United States of America, the Kingdom of France adopted a written constitution in 1791, but the Kingdom was abolished a year later and replaced with the First French Republic. The monarchy was restored by the great powers in 1814. During the later years of the elderly Charlemagnes rule, the Vikings made advances along the northern and western perimeters of the Kingdom of the Franks, after Charlemagnes death in 814 his heirs were incapable of maintaining political unity and the empire began to crumble. The Treaty of Verdun of 843 divided the Carolingian Empire into three parts, with Charles the Bald ruling over West Francia, the nucleus of what would develop into the kingdom of France. Viking advances were allowed to increase, and their dreaded longboats were sailing up the Loire and Seine rivers and other waterways, wreaking havoc. During the reign of Charles the Simple, Normans under Rollo from Norway, were settled in an area on either side of the River Seine, downstream from Paris, that was to become Normandy. With its offshoots, the houses of Valois and Bourbon, it was to rule France for more than 800 years. Henry II inherited the Duchy of Normandy and the County of Anjou, and married Frances newly divorced ex-queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, after the French victory at the Battle of Bouvines in 1214, the English monarchs maintained power only in southwestern Duchy of Guyenne. The death of Charles IV of France in 1328 without male heirs ended the main Capetian line, under Salic law the crown could not pass through a woman, so the throne passed to Philip VI, son of Charles of Valois

12.
Aix-en-Provence
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Aix-en-Provence, or simply Aix, is a city-commune in the south of France, about 30 km north of Marseille. It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte dAzur, in the department of Bouches-du-Rhône, the population of Aix numbers approximately 143,000. Its inhabitants are called Aixois or, less commonly, Aquisextains, Aix was founded in 123 BC by the Roman consul Sextius Calvinus, who gave his name to its springs, following the destruction of the nearby Gallic oppidum at Entremont. In the 4th century AD it became the metropolis of Narbonensis Secunda and it was occupied by the Visigoths in 477. In the succeeding century, the town was plundered by the Franks and Lombards. Aix passed to the crown of France with the rest of Provence in 1487, and in 1501 Louis XII established there the parliament of Provence, in the 17th and 18th centuries, the town was the seat of the Intendance of Provence. Current archeological excavations in the Ville des Tours, a suburb of Aix, have unearthed the remains of a Roman amphitheatre. The city slopes gently north to south and the Montagne Sainte-Victoire can easily be seen to the east. Aixs position in the south of France gives it a warm climate and it has an average January temperature of 5 °C and a July average of 23 °C. It has an average of 300 days of sunshine and only 91 days of rain, while it is partially protected from the Mistral, Aix still occasionally experiences the cooler and gusty conditions it brings. Unlike most of France which has a climate, Aix-en-Provence has a Mediterranean climate. The Cours Mirabeau is a thoroughfare, planted with double rows of plane-trees, bordered by fine houses. It follows the line of the old city wall and divides the town into two sections. The new town extends to the south and west, the old town, with its narrow, along this avenue, which is lined on one side with banks and on the other with cafés, is the Deux Garçons, the most famous brasserie in Aix. Built in 1792, it has been frequented by the likes of Paul Cézanne, Émile Zola, the Cathedral of the Holy Saviour is situated to the north in the medieval part of Aix. The archbishops palace and a Romanesque cloister adjoin the cathedral on its south side, the Archbishopric of Aix is now shared with Arles. Among its other public institutions, Aix also has the second most important Appeal Court outside of Paris, the Hôtel de Ville, a building in the classical style of the middle of the 17th century, looks onto a picturesque square. It contains some fine woodwork and tapestries, at its side rises a handsome clock-tower erected in 1510

13.
Provence
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The largest city of the region is Marseille. The Romans made the region into the first Roman province beyond the Alps and called it Provincia Romana and it was ruled by the Counts of Provence from their capital in Aix-en-Provence until 1481, when it became a province of the Kings of France. While it has been part of France for more than five hundred years, it retains a distinct cultural and linguistic identity. The coast of Provence has some of the earliest known sites of habitation in Europe. Primitive stone tools dated to 1 to 1.05 million years BC were found in the Grotte du Vallonnet near Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, tools dating to the Middle Paleolithic and Upper Paleolithic were discovered in the Observatory Cave, in the Jardin Exotique of Monaco. The Paleolithic period in Provence saw great changes in the climate, with the arrival, at the beginning of the Paleolithic period, the sea level in western Provence was 150 meters higher than it is today. By the end of the Paleolithic, it had dropped 100 to 150 metres lower than sea level. The cave dwellings of the inhabitants of Provence were regularly inundated by the rising sea or left far from the sea. The changes in the sea led to one of the most remarkable discoveries of signs of early man in Provence. In 1985, a diver named Henri Cosquer discovered the mouth of a submarine cave 37 metres below the surface of the Calanque de Morgiou near Marseille, the entrance led to a cave above sea level. Inside, the walls of the Cosquer Cave are decorated with drawings of bison, seals, auks, horses and outlines of human hands, dating to between 27,000 and 19,000 BC. The end of the Paleolithic and beginning of the Neolithic period saw the sea settle at its present level, a warming of the climate and the retreat of the forests. The disappearance of the forests and the deer and other easily hunted game meant that the inhabitants of Provence had to survive on rabbits, snails, since they were settled in one place they were able to develop new industries. Inspired by the pottery from the eastern Mediterranean, in about 6000 BC they created the first pottery to be made in France. Around 6000 BC, a wave of new settlers from the east and they were farmers and warriors, and gradually displaced the earlier pastoral people from their lands. They were followed in about 2500 BC by another wave of people, also farmers, known as the Courronniens, traces of these early civilisations can be found in many parts of Provence. A Neolithic site dating to about 6,000 BC was discovered in Marseille near the Saint-Charles railway station, and a dolmen from the Bronze Age can be found near Draguignan. Between the 10th and 4th century BC the Ligures were found in Provence from Massilia as far as modern day Liguria and they were of uncertain origin, they may have been the descendants of the indigenous neolithic peoples

14.
Angers Cathedral
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The Saint Maurice Cathedral of Angers is the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Angers in Angers, France. The original Romanesque church was rebuilt with Gothic details in the mid-12th century, the single-aisle plan was vaulted with pointed arches resting on a re-clad interior elevation. The nave consists of three bays, with single bays on either side of a crossing forming transepts, followed by a single-bay choir. The Cathedral of Angers was originally dedicated to the Virgin Mary, but, in 396, St. Martin, the Archbishop of Tours, added St. Maurice to the dedication. He had acquired a relic of some of the blood of the members of the Theban Legion, the relic was brought to Tours and later, according to legend, a phial of it was given to Angers. In the 7th Century, a devotion to St. Maurilius, a biography of him was written and, in 873, his body was transferred to the Cathedral. Two hundred years, St. Maurilius and St. Maurice were frequently mentioned together as the saints of the Cathedral. At the beginning of the century, Hubert de Vendôme. The new church was consecrated on 16 August 1025 but, seven years later, in 1032, right after the completion of the construction, during the rebuilding, the altar crucifix was blessed in 1051 and the new altar was consecrated in 1096. The new church was finished in the first half of the thirteenth century, under the crosier of Guillaume de Beaumont. Consequently, the Cathedral underwent a series of changes, in the 16th Century, the gallery, featuring the knight-companions of St. Maurice, was built by Jean Delespine and the facade was added. The spire in the Renaissance style, with a crown, was placed on the cusp of the north tower in 1518. In 1806, the porch, which stood in front of the facade, had to be demolished because of its dilapidated condition. Built in the Angevin Gothic style in front of the entrances gate, various reconstruction projects were developed in the 20th Century but none of them made it out of the planning stage. But the current incarnation was built only in 1617 by the maker, Jacques Girardet. An earlier organ was replaced in 1416 with a new case by Jean Chabencel but in 1451 it burned down, a replacement was built in 1507 on the initiative of Anne of Brittany on the original spot, the counter in the choir. It was restored for the first time, after a fire, in 1533 by Peter Bert and for the time, in 1701 by Marin Ingoult. When Ingoult was done, the organ had, besides the pedalboard,47 pipes with four keyboards, in the 18th Century, its case was replaced

15.
Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine
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Isabella was suo jure Duchess of Lorraine, from 25 January 1431 to her death in 1453. She was queen consort of Naples by marriage to Duke René of Anjou, King of Naples, Isabella served as general governor of her spouses domains in France during his imprisonment in Burgundy, as well as regent in the Kingdom of Naples, in 1435-1438. Isabella was the eldest daughter of Charles II, Duke of Lorraine, by the death of her brothers, it was made apparent in 1410 that she would be the successor of her father in Lorraine. She was given an education, and described as beautiful, witty, brave and with the ability to be careful. On 24 October 1420, she married René of Anjou, on 25 January 1431, Isabella inherited the duchy from her father upon his death, and ruled jointly with her husband as her co-ruler, as was customary for a female monarch at that time. Her right to rule was questioned by her cousin, count Antoine de Vaudémont, who captured Rene in the Battle of Bulgnéville and had him imprisoned with his ally and she led an army to rescue her husband from Philip III, Duke of Burgundy. She managed to secure a ceasefire, and the Emperor recognized her right to rule 24 April 1434. Rene appointed her to act as his general governor until his release, and she left with her son Louis and a fleet. The mid-16th century Chronicle of Gaspare Fuscolillo records that Isabella arrived in Naples on 15 October 1435, as regent of Naples, was to face the struggle with the other competitor to the throne of Naples, Alfonso of Aragon. She was given support from the pope, but could not cooperate well with its commander. Rene was released in 1437, and arrived in Naples to take over the rule from Isabella in May 1438, Isabella left with Louis to return to Lorraine in August 1440. In Lorraine, she finally defeated Antoine de Vaudémont 27 March 1441, when Charles VII of France visited in Nancy, they introduced Agnes Sorel to him, who was one of Isabellas ladies-in-waiting. She soon afterwards became the kings influential mistress, in July 1445, Isabella appointed her son John to be her governor general in Lorraine, and retired to her manor Launay in Saumur. Isabella died on 28 February 1453 at the age of 53 and her son John succeeded her as Duke of Lorraine. She was buried in Angers Cathedral, René then married, on 10 September 1454, Jeanne de Laval, but this marriage was childless. René and Isabella had the children, John II, Duke of Lorraine and King of Naples, married Marie de Bourbon, daughter of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon. He also had illegitimate children. Louis, Marquis of Pont-à-Mousson and Lieutenant General of Lorraine, at the age of five, in 1432, he was sent as a hostage to Dijon with his brother John in exchange for their captive father

16.
Jeanne de Laval
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Jeanne was born on 10 November 1433 at Auray, Brittany, the daughter of Guy XIV de Laval, Count of Laval and Isabella of Brittany. Her paternal grandparents were Jean de Montfort and Anne de Laval, and her grandparents were John V, Duke of Brittany. Her father Guy fought with Joan of Arc and his eldest son Francis de Laval, a Grand Master of France, would succeed him as Guy XV, Count of Laval. He had another two sons by his first wife Isabelle, Pierre de Laval and Jean de Laval, including Jeanne, he had a total of seven daughters, two of them died in early infancy. By his second wife, Françoise de Dinan, he had three sons, a marriage contract was drawn up on 3 September 1454 between Jeannes father and King René of Naples and Sicily. The wedding was celebrated on 10 September 1454, at the Abbey of St. Nicholas in Angers, at the age of twenty-one Jeanne married René, whose first wife, Isabella of Lorraine, had died the previous year. Jeannes husband was more than twenty years her senior, Jeanne, who was sweet and affectionate, seems to have been much loved by her husband. She became stepmother to Renés children, who included the future John II, Duke of Lorraine, Margaret of Anjou, Jeannes marriage to René was childless. After living three years in the mansions of Angers and Saumur, the king and queen lived in Provence in 1457 to 1462. In Aix-en-Provence, Angers, she participated with her husband in literary, René composed a 10,000 verse ode to Jeanne entitled, The Idyl of Regnault and Jeanneton. The poem was a debate on love between a shepherd and shepherdess with a pilgrim as arbiter, however, it sometimes seems to contain a good dose of conventional fiction. During his stay at Tarascon in Provence, René granted Jeanne the barony of Les Baux and she exchanged it on 18 February 1475 at Aix-en-Provence for Berre. She continued to live in Provence from 1469 to 1480, René died on 10 July 1480. In his will, he bequeathed his wife a large income in Anjou, Provence. She also retained the County of Beaufort and the lordship of Mirebeau, after her husbands death, she sometimes lived in Beaufort and sometimes in Saumur. She was popular for her kindness and generosity, the people of Beaufort were grateful to her when she regulated the use of common pastures. Jeanne died on 19 December 1498 at the Chateau de Beaufort-en-Vallée and she was sixty-five years of age. A street still bears her name, Queen of Sicily, by her will, she wished to be buried simply, without any monument, in the cathedral of Angers

17.
John II, Duke of Lorraine
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John II of Anjou was Duke of Lorraine from 1453 to his death. He inherited the duchy from his mother, Duchess Isabelle, during the life of his father, Duke René of Anjou, also Duke of Lorraine and titular king of Naples. As heir-apparent of Naples, he was styled the Duke of Calabria, in 1460, he decisively defeated the king of Naples Ferdinand at Nola, but was unable to prevent others from coming to his aid. He was defeated on land at Troia in 1462 and defeated at sea off Ischia in 1465, in 1466, the Catalonians chose his father as King of Aragon, and he was created Prince of Girona, as heir-apparent. He went into Catalonia to press the claims, but died, supposedly by poison. He married in 1444 Marie de Bourbon, daughter of Charles I and they had, Isabelle, d. young René, d. young Marie, d. young Jean, Nicholas

18.
Yolande, Duchess of Lorraine
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Yolande, Duchess of Lorraine, also known as Yolande de Bar, was Duchess of Lorraine and Bar. She was the daughter of Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine, because of her various titles, she is also known as Yolande de Lorraine and Yolande dAnjou. Her younger sister was Margaret of Anjou, Queen consort of Henry VI of England, though she was nominally in control of major territories, she ceded her power and titles to her husband and her son. It was later adapted to Tchaikovskys opera Iolanta, there is no evidence that she was ever blind. In 1445, she married her second cousin Frederick II, Count of Vaudémont, the marriage was a dynastic alliance, arranged to end the dispute which existed between René of Anjou and Fredericks father, Antoine of Vaudémont, regarding the succession to the Duchy of Lorraine. On 1 September 1485 he married secondly, Phillipa of Guelders, by whom he had issue, from whom descended Mary, Nicolas of Lorraine, Lord of Joinville and Bauffremont, died in 1476. Peter of Lorraine, died in 1451, jeanne of Lorraine, married in 1474 to Charles IV, Duke of Anjou. There was no issue from the marriage, Yolande of Lorraine, who died in 1500, married William II, Landgrave of Hesse, by whom she had issue. Marguerite of Lorraine, married René, Duke of Alençon and she had issue, from whom descended King Henry IV of France. In 1473, on the death of her nephew Nicolas, she inherited the Duchy of Lorraine, in 1480, after the death of her father, she did the same with the Duchy of Bar. She died on 23 March 1483, which was the birthday of her sister Queen Margaret, blinded in a childhood accident, her attendants must keep from her the knowledge that she is blind, while a Moorish physician conducts a long slow medical procedure to restore her sight. Once it is complete, she must be told of her blindness to awaken the desire to see, Count Vaudémont arrives for his arranged marriage, which he resents. He accidentally finds her garden, and falls in love with her without knowing who she is. He discovers she is blind, and tells her so, however, the physician is now able to complete the treatment and she is cured. The portrayal of Yolande as a saintly dreaming beauty was immensely popular, the play was translated into numerous languages. It received its premiere on 18 December 1892 in St. Petersburg, the heroines name was given as Iolanthe in the original Danish version and in the English translation by Theodore Martin, making this version of her name familiar in the 19th century. In 1913 a silent film of Hertzs play was made by the Thanhouser Company and it was also adapted in 1990 as the German film Das Licht der Liebe. In the pseudohistorical book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail Yolande de Bar was alleged to have been the tenth Grand Master of the Priory of Sion, succeeding her father, King René

19.
Margaret of Anjou
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Margaret of Anjou was the wife of King Henry VI of England. As such, she was Queen of England from 1445 to 1461, born in the Duchy of Lorraine into the House of Valois-Anjou, Margaret was the second eldest daughter of René of Anjou and Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine. She was one of the figures in the series of dynastic civil wars known as the Wars of the Roses. Owing to her husbands frequent bouts of insanity, Margaret ruled the kingdom in his place, Margaret was taken prisoner by the victorious Yorkists after the Lancastrian defeat at Tewkesbury. In 1475, she was ransomed by her cousin, King Louis XI of France and she went to live in France as a poor relation of the French king, and she died there at the age of 52. Margaret was born on 23 March 1430 at Pont-à-Mousson in Lorraine, a fief of the Holy Roman Empire east of France ruled by a branch of the French kings. Margaret was the daughter of René of Anjou and of Isabella. She had five brothers and four sisters, as well as three half-siblings from her fathers relationships with mistresses. Her father, popularly known as Good King René, was duke of Anjou and titular king of Naples, Sicily and Jerusalem, he has described as a man of many crowns. Her mother took care of her education and may have arranged for her to have lessons with the scholar Antoine de la Sale, in childhood Margaret was known as la petite créature. On 23 April 1445, Margaret married King Henry VI of England, Henry at the time also claimed the Kingdom of France and controlled various parts of northern France. The English government, fearing a negative reaction, kept this provision secret from the English public. Margaret was crowned Queen Consort of England on 30 May 1445 at Westminster Abbey by John Stafford and she was described as beautiful, and furthermore already a woman, passionate and proud and strong-willed. Those that anticipated the return of English claims to French territory believed that she already understood her duty to protect the interests of the Crown fervently. Thus by family example and her own personality, she was fully capable of becoming the champion of the Crown. Henry, who was interested in religion and learning than in military matters, was not a successful king. He had reigned since he was only a few months old, when he married Margaret, his mental condition was already unstable and by the birth of their only son, Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales, he had suffered a complete breakdown. Rumours were rife that he was incapable of begetting a child, many have speculated that either Edmund Beaufort, 2nd Duke of Somerset, or James Butler, 5th Earl of Ormond, both staunch allies of Margaret, was the young princes actual father

20.
Dynasty
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A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family, usually in the context of a feudal or monarchical system but sometimes also appearing in elective republics. The dynastic family or lineage may be known as a house, historians periodize the histories of many sovereign states, such as Ancient Egypt, the Carolingian Empire and Imperial China, using a framework of successive dynasties. As such, the dynasty may be used to delimit the era during which the family reigned and to describe events, trends. The word dynasty itself is often dropped from such adjectival references, until the 19th century, it was taken for granted that a legitimate function of a monarch was to aggrandize his dynasty, that is, to increase the territory, wealth, and power of his family members. The longest-surviving dynasty in the world is the Imperial House of Japan, dynasties throughout the world have traditionally been reckoned patrilineally, such as under the Frankish Salic law. Succession through a daughter when permitted was considered to establish a new dynasty in her husbands ruling house, however, some states in Africa, determined descent matrilineally, while rulers have at other times adopted the name of their mothers dynasty when coming into her inheritance. It is also extended to unrelated people such as poets of the same school or various rosters of a single sports team. The word dynasty derives via Latin dynastia from Greek dynastéia, where it referred to power, dominion and it was the abstract noun of dynástēs, the agent noun of dynamis, power or ability, from dýnamai, to be able. A ruler in a dynasty is referred to as a dynast. For example, following his abdication, Edward VIII of the United Kingdom ceased to be a member of the House of Windsor. A dynastic marriage is one that complies with monarchical house law restrictions, the marriage of Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange, to Máxima Zorreguieta in 2002 was dynastic, for example, and their eldest child is expected to inherit the Dutch crown eventually. But the marriage of his younger brother Prince Friso to Mabel Wisse Smit in 2003 lacked government support, thus Friso forfeited his place in the order of succession, lost his title as a Prince of the Netherlands, and left his children without dynastic rights. In historical and monarchist references to formerly reigning families, a dynast is a member who would have had succession rights, were the monarchys rules still in force. Even since abolition of the Austrian monarchy, Max and his descendants have not been considered the rightful pretenders by Austrian monarchists, nor have they claimed that position. The term dynast is sometimes used only to refer to descendants of a realms monarchs. The term can therefore describe overlapping but distinct sets of people, yet he is not a male-line member of the royal family, and is therefore not a dynast of the House of Windsor. Thus, in 1999 he requested and obtained permission from Elizabeth II to marry the Roman Catholic Princess Caroline of Monaco. Yet a clause of the English Act of Settlement 1701 remained in effect at that time and that exclusion, too, ceased to apply on 26 March 2015, with retroactive effect for those who had been dynasts prior to triggering it by marriage to a Catholic

21.
House of Valois-Anjou
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The House of Valois-Anjou was a noble French family, deriving from the royal family, the House of Valois. They were monarchs of Naples, as well as other territories. The house began in the 1350s, when king John II of France, of the House of Valois line of Capetians and his paternal grandmother, Margaret, Countess of Anjou and Maine, had been a princess of the Capetian House of Anjou or Elder Angevin Dynasty. She was the eldest daughter of king Charles II of Naples and gave the county, within a couple of decades, Queen Joan I of Naples, also of the senior Angevin line, realized that she would remain childless. Although there were extant heirs of the branch, for example. The extinction of the line of the House of Anjou-Durazzo in 1435 temporarily secured Naples for the Valois House of Anjou, rené, the last duke of this, third, Angevin line, died in 1480, and Anjou reverted to the French crown. With the death of his nephew the Duke of Maine in 1481 all Angevin possessions, including Provence, Angevin Empire House of Plantagenet or first Angevin dynasty Capetian House of Anjou or second Angevin dynasty Armorial of Plantagenet

22.
Louis II of Naples
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Louis II was King of Naples from 1389 until 1399 and Duke of Anjou from 1384 until 1417. He was a member of the House of Valois-Anjou, born in Toulouse, Louis II was the son of Louis I of Anjou, King of Naples, and Marie of Blois. He came into his Angevin inheritance, which included Provence, in 1384, with his rival Charles of Durazzo, of the senior Angevin line, most towns in Provence revolted after the death of his father. His mother then raised an army and they traveled from town to town, Louis was recognized as Count of Provence in 1387. He founded a university in Aix-en-Provence in 1409, in 1386, Charles of Durazzos son, the underage Ladislaus, was expelled from Naples soon after his father died. Louis II was crowned King of Naples by the Avignonese antipope Clement VII on 1 November 1389 and he was ousted in turn by his rival in 1399. In 1409, Louis liberated Rome from Ladislaus occupation, in 1410, as an ally of the antipope John XXIII he attacked Ladislaus, eventually Louis lost his Neapolitan support and had to retire. His claim to Naples passed to his son, Louis III and he married his first cousin once removed Yolande of Aragon in Arles in 1400, giving him a possibility of inheriting the throne of Aragon through her right. Her father, King John I of Aragon had died in 1396 and his son Louis was bethrothed to Catherine of Burgundy, a daughter of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy. However, after John instigated a mob attack on the Dauphin of France, he, the betrothal to Catherine was repudiated, which caused the enmity of the Duke of Burgundy. He was not present at the Battle of Agincourt, because he had a bladder infection, after the battle, he fled from Paris to join his wife and children at Angers. Louis II died at his chateau of Angers, the county town of Anjou, Louis and Yolande had five surviving children, Louis III of Anjou, titular King of Naples, Duke of Anjou. René of Anjou, King of Naples, Duke of Anjou, Charles of Le Maine, Count of Maine. Marie of Anjou, married 1422 at Bourges Charles VII of France, Yolande, married firstly Philip I, Duke of Brabant and secondly in 1431, Francis I, Duke of Brittany. The Good King, René of Anjou and Fifteenth Century Europe

23.
Yolande of Aragon
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She was a daughter of John I of Aragon and his wife Yolande of Bar. Yolande played a role in the struggles between France and England, influencing events such as the financing of Joan of Arcs army in 1429 that helped tip the balance in favour of the French. She was also known as Yolanda de Aragón and Violant dAragó, tradition holds that she commissioned the famous Rohan Hours. Yolande was born in Zaragoza, Aragon, on 11 August 1384, the eldest daughter of King John I of Aragon by his wife, Yolande of Bar. She had three brothers and two sisters, as well as five older half-siblings from her fathers first marriage to Martha of Armagnac, Yolande later played an important role in the politics of England, France, and Aragon during the first half of the 15th century. In 1389, Louis II was crowned King of Naples and his mother Marie of Blois opened negotiations for a marriage between her son and Yolande to prevent Aragon from obstructing his rule there. When Yolande was eleven, she signed a document to disavow any promises made by ambassadors about her marrying Louis II, in 1395, Richard II of England also opened negotiations for Yolandes hand. To prevent this marriage, Charles VI of France offered his own daughter Isabella to King Richard, after the death of Yolandes father, Marie of Blois convinced Yolandes uncle Martin I of Aragon to have Yolande wed Louis II. Yolande signed a protest, but was forced to retract it later, the couple married in Arles on December 2,1400. Despite Yolandes earlier objections and the illnesses of her husband. As the surviving daughter of King John I of Aragon, she claimed the throne of Aragon after the deaths of her elder sister Joanna, Countess of Foix, and her uncle, King Martin I. However, unclear though they were, the laws of succession for Aragon, the Anjou candidate for the throne of Aragon was Yolandes eldest son Louis III of Anjou, Duke of Calabria, whose claim was forfeited in the Pact of Caspe. Yolande and her sons regarded themselves as the heirs with the stronger claim, as a result of this additional inheritance, Yolande was called the Queen of Four Kingdoms - the four apparently Sicily, Jerusalem, Cyprus and Aragon. Another interpretation specifies Naples separate from Sicily, plus Jerusalem and Aragon, the number could be raised to seven if the two component kingdoms of the Crown of Aragon and Sardinia were included. However, the reality was that Yolande and her family controlled territories in the kingdoms only at short intervals. Their true realm was the Anjou fiefdoms across France, they held uncontestably the provinces of Provence and Anjou, Yolandes son René I of Anjou became ruler of Lorraine through his marriage to Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine. In the emerging second phase of the Hundred Years War, Yolande chose to support the French against the English, in the same year, Yolande met with Queen Isabeau of France to finalize a marriage contract between her daughter Marie and Isabeaus third surviving son Charles. After his two brothers died, she supported the claim of the Dauphin Charles who, relying upon Yolandes resources and help

24.
Roman Catholicism
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The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church or the Universal Church, is the largest Christian church, with more than 1.28 billion members worldwide. As one of the oldest religious institutions in the world, it has played a prominent role in the history, headed by the Bishop of Rome, known as the Pope, the churchs doctrines are summarised in the Nicene Creed and the Apostles Creed. Its central administration is located in Vatican City, enclaved within Rome, the Catholic Church is notable within Western Christianity for its sacred tradition and seven sacraments. It teaches that it is the one church founded by Jesus Christ, that its bishops are the successors of Christs apostles. The Catholic Church maintains that the doctrine on faith and morals that it declares as definitive is infallible. The Latin Church, the Eastern Catholic Churches, as well as such as mendicant orders and enclosed monastic orders. Among the sacraments, the one is the Eucharist, celebrated liturgically in the Mass. The church teaches that through consecration by a priest the sacrificial bread and wine become the body, the Catholic Church practises closed communion, with only baptised members in a state of grace ordinarily permitted to receive the Eucharist. The Virgin Mary is venerated in the Catholic Church as Queen of Heaven and is honoured in numerous Marian devotions. The Catholic Church has influenced Western philosophy, science, art and culture, Catholic spiritual teaching includes spreading the Gospel while Catholic social teaching emphasises support for the sick, the poor and the afflicted through the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. The Catholic Church is the largest non-government provider of education and medical services in the world, from the late 20th century, the Catholic Church has been criticised for its doctrines on sexuality, its refusal to ordain women and its handling of sexual abuse cases. Catholic was first used to describe the church in the early 2nd century, the first known use of the phrase the catholic church occurred in the letter from Saint Ignatius of Antioch to the Smyrnaeans, written about 110 AD. In the Catechetical Discourses of Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, the name Catholic Church was used to distinguish it from other groups that call themselves the church. The use of the adjective Roman to describe the Church as governed especially by the Bishop of Rome became more widespread after the Fall of the Western Roman Empire and into the Early Middle Ages. Catholic Church is the name used in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church follows an episcopal polity, led by bishops who have received the sacrament of Holy Orders who are given formal jurisdictions of governance within the church. Ultimately leading the entire Catholic Church is the Bishop of Rome, commonly called the pope, in parallel to the diocesan structure are a variety of religious institutes that function autonomously, often subject only to the authority of the pope, though sometimes subject to the local bishop. Most religious institutes only have male or female members but some have both, additionally, lay members aid many liturgical functions during worship services

25.
Occitan language
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Occitan, also known as lenga dòc by its native speakers, is a Romance language. It is spoken in southern France, Italys Occitan Valleys, Monaco, and Spains Val dAran, collectively, Occitan is also spoken in the linguistic enclave of Guardia Piemontese. However, there is controversy about the unity of the language, others include Catalan in this family, as the distance between this language and some Occitan dialects is similar to the distance among different Occitan dialects. In fact, Catalan was considered an Occitan dialect until the end of the 19th century, today, Occitan is an official language in Catalonia, where a subdialect of Gascon known as Aranese is spoken in the Val dAran. Since September 2010, the Parliament of Catalonia has considered Aranese Occitan to be the preferred language for use in the Val dAran. Unlike other Romance languages such as French or Spanish, there is no written standard language called Occitan. Instead, there are competing norms for writing Occitan, some of which attempt to be pan-dialectal, There are also significant lexical differences, where some dialects have words cognate with French, and others have Catalan and Spanish cognates. Nonetheless, there is a significant amount of mutual intelligibility, the long-term survival of Occitan is in grave doubt. According to the UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages, four of the six dialects of Occitan are considered severely endangered. The name Occitan comes from lenga dòc, òc being the Occitan word for yes and this was not, of course, the only defining characteristic of each group. The word òc came from Vulgar Latin hoc, while oïl originated from Latin hoc illud, Old Catalan, and now the Catalan of Northern Catalonia also have hoc. Other Romance languages derive their word for yes from the Latin sic, thus, etc. such as Spanish sí, Eastern Lombard sé, Sicilian and Italian sì, or Portuguese sim. French uses si to answer yes in response to questions that are asked in the negative sense, the name Occitan is sometimes considered a neologism, however, it was attested around 1300 as occitanus, a crossing of oc and aquitanus. For many centuries, the Occitan dialects were referred to as Limousin or Provençal, after Frédéric Mistrals Félibrige movement in the 19th century, Provençal achieved the greatest literary recognition and so became the most popular term for Occitan. The term first came into fashion in Italy, currently, linguists use the terms Provençal and Limousin strictly to refer to specific varieties within Occitania, keeping the name Occitan for the language as a whole. Many non-specialists, however, continue to refer to the language as Provençal, NO·L LI TOLRÀ NO·L LI DEVEDARÀ NI NO LEN DECEBRÀ. Nec societatem non AURÀ, si per castellum recuperare NON O FA, et si recuperare potuerit in potestate Froterio et Raimundo LO TORNARÀ, carolingian litanies, both written and sung in Latin, were answered to in Old Occitan by the audience. Occitan was the vehicle for the poetry of the medieval troubadours and trobairises, At that time

26.
French language
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French is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages, French has evolved from Gallo-Romance, the spoken Latin in Gaul, and more specifically in Northern Gaul. Its closest relatives are the other langues doïl—languages historically spoken in northern France and in southern Belgium, French was also influenced by native Celtic languages of Northern Roman Gaul like Gallia Belgica and by the Frankish language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. Today, owing to Frances past overseas expansion, there are numerous French-based creole languages, a French-speaking person or nation may be referred to as Francophone in both English and French. French is a language in 29 countries, most of which are members of la francophonie. As of 2015, 40% of the population is in Europe, 35% in sub-Saharan Africa, 15% in North Africa and the Middle East, 8% in the Americas. French is the fourth-most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union, 1/5 of Europeans who do not have French as a mother tongue speak French as a second language. As a result of French and Belgian colonialism from the 17th and 18th century onward, French was introduced to new territories in the Americas, Africa, most second-language speakers reside in Francophone Africa, in particular Gabon, Algeria, Mauritius, Senegal and Ivory Coast. In 2015, French was estimated to have 77 to 110 million native speakers, approximately 274 million people are able to speak the language. The Organisation internationale de la Francophonie estimates 700 million by 2050, in 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked French the third most useful language for business, after English and Standard Mandarin Chinese. Under the Constitution of France, French has been the language of the Republic since 1992. France mandates the use of French in official government publications, public education except in specific cases, French is one of the four official languages of Switzerland and is spoken in the western part of Switzerland called Romandie, of which Geneva is the largest city. French is the language of about 23% of the Swiss population. French is also a language of Luxembourg, Monaco, and Aosta Valley, while French dialects remain spoken by minorities on the Channel Islands. A plurality of the worlds French-speaking population lives in Africa and this number does not include the people living in non-Francophone African countries who have learned French as a foreign language. Due to the rise of French in Africa, the total French-speaking population worldwide is expected to reach 700 million people in 2050, French is the fastest growing language on the continent. French is mostly a language in Africa, but it has become a first language in some urban areas, such as the region of Abidjan, Ivory Coast and in Libreville. There is not a single African French, but multiple forms that diverged through contact with various indigenous African languages, sub-Saharan Africa is the region where the French language is most likely to expand, because of the expansion of education and rapid population growth

27.
Italian language
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By most measures, Italian, together with Sardinian, is the closest to Latin of the Romance languages. Italian is a language in Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City. Italian is spoken by minorities in places such as France, Montenegro, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Crimea and Tunisia and by large expatriate communities in the Americas. Many speakers are native bilinguals of both standardized Italian and other regional languages, Italian is the fourth most studied language in the world. Italian is a major European language, being one of the languages of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe. It is the third most widely spoken first language in the European Union with 65 million native speakers, including Italian speakers in non-EU European countries and on other continents, the total number of speakers is around 85 million. Italian is the working language of the Holy See, serving as the lingua franca in the Roman Catholic hierarchy as well as the official language of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. Italian is known as the language of music because of its use in musical terminology and its influence is also widespread in the arts and in the luxury goods market. Italian has been reported as the fourth or fifth most frequently taught foreign language in the world, Italian was adopted by the state after the Unification of Italy, having previously been a literary language based on Tuscan as spoken mostly by the upper class of Florentine society. Its development was influenced by other Italian languages and to some minor extent. Its vowels are the second-closest to Latin after Sardinian, unlike most other Romance languages, Italian retains Latins contrast between short and long consonants. As in most Romance languages, stress is distinctive, however, Italian as a language used in Italy and some surrounding regions has a longer history. What would come to be thought of as Italian was first formalized in the early 14th century through the works of Tuscan writer Dante Alighieri, written in his native Florentine. Dante is still credited with standardizing the Italian language, and thus the dialect of Florence became the basis for what would become the language of Italy. Italian was also one of the recognised languages in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Italy has always had a dialect for each city, because the cities. Those dialects now have considerable variety, as Tuscan-derived Italian came to be used throughout Italy, features of local speech were naturally adopted, producing various versions of Regional Italian. Even in the case of Northern Italian languages, however, scholars are not to overstate the effects of outsiders on the natural indigenous developments of the languages

28.
Piedmont
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Piedmont is one of the 20 regions of Italy. It has an area of 25,402 square kilometres and a population of about 4.6 million, the capital of Piedmont is Turin. The name Piedmont comes from medieval Latin Pedemontium or Pedemontis, i. e. ad pedem montium, meaning “at the foot of the mountains”. Other towns of Piedmont with more than 20,000 inhabitants sorted by population and it borders with France, Switzerland and the Italian regions of Lombardy, Liguria, Aosta Valley and for a very small fragment with Emilia Romagna. The geography of Piedmont is 43. 3% mountainous, along with areas of hills. Piedmont is the second largest of Italys 20 regions, after Sicily and it is broadly coincident with the upper part of the drainage basin of the river Po, which rises from the slopes of Monviso in the west of the region and is Italy’s largest river. The Po collects all the waters provided within the semicircle of mountains which surround the region on three sides, from the highest peaks the land slopes down to hilly areas, and then to the upper, and then to the lower great Padan Plain. 7. 6% of the territory is considered protected area. There are 56 different national or regional parks, one of the most famous is the Gran Paradiso National Park located between Piedmont and the Aosta Valley, Piedmont was inhabited in early historic times by Celtic-Ligurian tribes such as the Taurini and the Salassi. They were later subdued by the Romans, who founded several colonies there including Augusta Taurinorum, after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the region was repeatedly invaded by the Burgundians, the Goths, Byzantines, Lombards, Franks. In the 9th–10th centuries there were incursions by the Magyars. At the time Piedmont, as part of the Kingdom of Italy within the Holy Roman Empire, was subdivided into several marks, in 1046, Oddo of Savoy added Piedmont to their main territory of Savoy, with a capital at Chambéry. Other areas remained independent, such as the powerful comuni of Asti and Alessandria, the County of Savoy was elevated to a duchy in 1416, and Duke Emanuele Filiberto moved the seat to Turin in 1563. In 1720, the Duke of Savoy became King of Sardinia, founding what evolved into the Kingdom of Sardinia, the Republic of Alba was created in 1796 as a French client republic in Piedmont. A new client republic, the Piedmontese Republic, existed between 1798 and 1799 before it was reoccupied by Austrian and Russian troops, in June 1800 a third client republic, the Subalpine Republic, was established in Piedmont. It fell under full French control in 1801 and it was annexed by France in September 1802, in the congress of Vienna, the Kingdom of Sardinia was restored, and furthermore received the Republic of Genoa to strengthen it as a barrier against France. Piedmont was a springboard for Italys unification in 1859–1861, following earlier unsuccessful wars against the Austrian Empire in 1820–1821 and this process is sometimes referred to as Piedmontisation. However, the efforts were countered by the efforts of rural farmers

29.
Duchy of Bar
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The County of Bar, from 1354 the Duchy of Bar, was a principality of the Holy Roman Empire encompassing the pays de Barrois and centred on the city of Bar-le-Duc. Part of the county, the so-called Barrois mouvant, became a fief of the Kingdom of France in 1301, the Barrois non-mouvant remained a part of the Empire. From 1480, it was united to the imperial Duchy of Lorraine, both imperial Bar and Lorraine were ceded to France in 1738. With the death of the last duke, Stanislaus Leszczynski, in 1766, the county of Bar originated in the frontier fortress of Bar that Duke Frederick I of Upper Lorraine built on the bank of the river Ornain around 960. The fortress was originally directed at the counts of Champagne, who had made incursions into Fredericks allodial lands, Frederick also confiscated some lands from the nearby Abbey of Saint-Mihiel and settled his knights on it. The original Barrois was thus a mixture of the dukes allodial lands, on the death of Duke Frederick III in 1033, these lands passed to his sister, Sophia, who was the first person to associate the comital title with Bar, styling herself Countess of Bar. Sophias descendants, of the House of Montbéliard, expanded Bar by usurpation, conquest, purchase and its population was francophone and culturally French, and the counts were involved in French politics. Count Reginald II married Agnes, a sister of the queen of France and his son, Henry I, died on the Third Crusade in 1190. From 1214 to 1291 Bar was ruled by Henry II and Theobald II, in the Treaty of Bruges of 1301 Henry was forced to recognise all of his county west of the river Meuse as a fief of France. This was the origin of the Barrois mouvant, a territory that was turned into a fief was said to have moved and entered the mouvance of its suzerain and it was subject to the Parliament of Paris. The Treaty of Bruges did not represent any expansion of French territory, the territory to the west of the Meuse was French since the Treaty of Verdun of 843, but in 1301 it became a direct fief of the crown, including its allodial parts. In 1354 the Count of Bar took the title and was thereafter recognised as a Peer of France. Père Anselme believed that Count Robert had been created a duke by King John II of France in preparation for the marriage to Johns daughter. The rulers of Bar were not created dukes by imperial appointment, the only title Count Robert received by imperial grant in 1354 was that of Margrave of Pont-à-Mousson. This margraviate was bestowed by the Dukes of Bar on their heirs apparent. In that same year the emperor raised the County of Luxembourg into a duchy, Bar passed to his great-nephew, René I, who was married to Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine. In 1431 the couple inherited Lorraine, on Renés death in 1480, Bar passed to his daughter Yolanda and her son, René II, who was already Duke of Lorraine. In 1482 he conquered the prévôté of Virton, a part of the Duchy of Luxembourg, in 1484 Peter II, Duke of Bourbon, regent for King Charles VIII of France, formally installed him in the Duchy of Bar

30.
Duke of Lorraine
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The rulers of Lorraine have held different posts under different governments over different regions. The first rulers of the region were kings of the Franks whose kingdom was called Lotharingia, the Latin construction Lotharingia evolved over time into Lorraine in French, Lotharingen in Dutch and Lothringen in German. After the Carolingian kingdom was absorbed into its neighbouring realms in the ninth century. In 880, the Treaty of Ribemont gave the whole of Lotharingia to Louis the Younger, Charles the Bald Louis the Younger Charles the Fat Arnulf of Carinthia Zwentibold Louis the Child Charles the Simple In 925, Lotharingia was subsumed into East Francia. Gebhard Reginar Gilbert Henry Otto Conrad Bruno In 959, Lorraine was divided into two districts, Upper and Lower, each being given to a margrave or vice-duke under Bruno. Upon Brunos death in 965, that of Lower Lorraine, whose margrave had died, was vacant until 977. In that year Charles was appointed duke of Lower Lorraine and Frederick I was elevated duke in Upper Lorraine, the two duchies remained separate, following separate pathways, except for the brief period between 1033 and 1044. Note that the numbering of the varies between sources. Frederick I Thierry I Frederick II Frederick III Gothelo, godfrey, the Bearded Junior branch of the previous rulers of Ardennes–Metz, known as the House of Lorraine The House of Habsburg-Lorraine continued carrying the title as titular Dukes of Lorraine. Lorraine Lorraine Lorraine Titles of the dukes of Lorraine from contemporary documents with bibliography Putnam, alsace and Lorraine, From Cæsar to Kaiser,58 B. C. -1871 A. D

31.
Lower Lorraine
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It was created out of the former Middle Frankish realm of Lotharingia under King Lothair II, that had been established in 855. It then formed a duchy in its own right, and about 925 Duke Gilbert declared homage to the German king Henry the Fowler, from that time on Lotharingia remained a German stem duchy, the border with France did not change throughout the Middle Ages. In 959 King Henrys son Duke Bruno the Great divided Lotharingia into two duchies, Lower and Upper Lorraine and granted Count Godfrey I of Mons the title of a Duke of Lower Lorraine, godfreys lands were to the north, while Upper Lorraine was to the south. Both duchies formed the part of the Holy Roman Empire established by Brunos elder brother Emperor Otto I in 962. Lower and Upper Lorraine were once again reunited under Gothelo I from 1033 to 1044. After that, the Lower duchy was quickly marginalised, while Upper Lorraine came to be known as simply the Duchy of Lorraine. Upon the death of Duke Godfrey III in 1190, his son Duke Henry I of Brabant inherited the title by order of Emperor Henry VI at the Diet of Schwäbisch Hall. Thereby the Duchy of Lower Lorraine finally lost its territorial authority, after the territorial power of the duchy was shattered, many fiefdoms came to independence in its area

32.
Kingdom of Naples
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It continued to be officially known as the Kingdom of Sicily, although it no longer included the island of Sicily. For much of its existence, the realm was contested between French and Spanish dynasties, in 1816, it was reunified with the island kingdom of Sicily once again to form the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Following the rebellion in 1282, King Charles I of Sicily was forced to leave the island of Sicily by Peter III of Aragons troops, Charles, however, maintained his possessions on the mainland, customarily known as the Kingdom of Naples, after its capital city. Charles and his Angevin successors maintained a claim to Sicily, warring against the Aragonese until 1373, joans reign was contested by Louis the Great, the Angevin King of Hungary, who captured the kingdom several times. Queen Joan I also played a part in the demise of the first Kingdom of Naples. This led to Joan Is murder at the hands of the Prince of Durazzo in 1382, the two competing Angevin lines contested each other for the possession of the Kingdom of Naples over the following decades. René of Anjou temporarily united the claims of junior and senior Angevin lines, in 1442, however, Alfonso V conquered the Kingdom of Naples and unified Sicily and Naples once again as dependencies of Aragon. At his death in 1458, the kingdom was again separated and Naples was inherited by Ferrante, Alfonsos illegitimate son. Charles VIII expelled Alfonso II of Naples from Naples in 1495, Ferrantino was restored to the throne, but died in 1496, and was succeeded by his uncle, Frederick IV. Charles VIIIs successor, Louis XII reiterated the French claim, in 1501, he occupied Naples and partitioned the kingdom with Ferdinand of Aragon, who abandoned his cousin King Frederick. The deal soon fell through, however, and Aragon and France resumed their war over the kingdom, the Spanish troops occupying Calabria and Apulia, led by Gonzalo Fernandez de Cordova did not respect the new agreement, and expelled all Frenchmen from the area. The peace treaties that continued were never definitive, but they established at least that the title of King of Naples was reserved for Ferdinands grandson, the future Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. Ferdinand nevertheless continued in possession of the kingdom, being considered as the heir of his uncle Alfonso I of Naples. The French finally abandoned their claims to Naples by the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559, in the Treaty of London, five cities on coast of Tuscany were designated the Stato dei Presidi, and part of the Kingdom of Naples. After the War of the Spanish Succession in the early 18th century, under the terms of the Treaty of Rastatt in 1714, Naples was given to Charles VI, the Holy Roman Emperor. He also gained control of Sicily in 1720, but Austrian rule did not last long, when Charles inherited the Spanish throne from his older half-brother in 1759, he left Naples and Sicily to his younger son, Ferdinand IV. Despite the two Kingdoms being in a union under the Habsburg and Bourbon dynasts, they remained constitutionally separate. Being a member of the House of Bourbon, Ferdinand IV was an opponent of the French Revolution and Napoleon

33.
King of Jerusalem
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The King of Jerusalem was the supreme ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Crusader state founded by Christian princes in 1099 when the First Crusade took the city. Godfrey of Bouillon, the first ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, himself refused the title of king, thus, the title of king was only introduced for his successor, King Baldwin I in 1100. The city of Jerusalem was lost in 1187, but the Kingdom of Jerusalem survived, the city of Jerusalem was re-captured in the Sixth Crusade, during 1229–39 and 1241–44. The Kingdom of Jerusalem was finally dissolved with the fall of Acre, after the Crusader States ceased to exist, the title of King of Jerusalem was claimed by a number of European noble houses descended from the kings of Cyprus or the kings of Naples. The title of King of Jerusalem is currently used by Felipe VI of Spain and it was claimed by Otto von Habsburg as Habsburg pretender until his renunciation of all claims in 1958, and by the kings of Italy until 1946. The following year, his brother Baldwin I was the first to use the title king, the kingship of Jerusalem was partially elected and partially hereditary. During the height of the kingdom in the century there was a royal family. Nevertheless, the king was elected, or at least recognized, here the king was considered a primus inter pares, and in his absence his duties were performed by his seneschal. The purpose-built royal palace used from the 1160s onwards was located south of Jerusalems citadel, the Kingdom of Jerusalem introduced French feudal structures to the Levant. The king personally held several fiefs incorporated into the royal domain and he was also responsible for leading the kingdom into battle, although this duty could be passed to a constable. While several contemporary European states were moving towards centralized monarchies, the king of Jerusalem was continually losing power to the strongest of his barons and this was partially due to the young age of many of the kings, and the frequency of regents from the ranks of the nobles. After the fall of Jerusalem in 1187, the capital of the kingdom was moved to Acre, in this period the kingship was often simply a nominal position, held by a European ruler who never actually lived in Acre. The claim was made in 1264 as senior descendant and rightful heir of Alice of Champagne, second daughter of Queen Isabella I, Hugh being the son of their eldest daughter. But was passed over by the Haute Cour in favour of his cousin, Hugh of Antioch, after Conrad IIIs execution by Charles I of Sicily in 1268, the kingship was held by the Lusignan family, who were simultaneously kings of Cyprus. However, Charles I of Sicily purchased the rights of one of the heirs of the kingdom in 1277, in that year, he sent Roger of Sanseverino to the East as his bailiff. Roger captured Acre and obtained a forced homage from the barons, Roger was recalled in 1282 due to the Sicilian Vespers and left Odo Poilechien in his place to rule. His resources and authority was minimal, and he was ejected by Henry II of Cyprus when he arrived from Cyprus for his coronation as King of Jerusalem, Acre was captured by the Mamluks in 1291, eliminating the crusader presence on the mainland. In 1127 Fulk V, Count of Anjou received an embassy from King Baldwin II of Jerusalem, Baldwin II had no male heirs but had already designated his daughter Melisende to succeed him

34.
Kingdom of Jerusalem
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The Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem was a crusader state established in the Southern Levant by Godfrey of Bouillon in 1099 after the First Crusade. The kingdom lasted nearly two hundred years, from 1099 until 1291 when the last remaining possession, Acre, was destroyed by the Mamluks, the sometimes so-called First Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted from 1099 to 1187, when it was almost entirely overrun by Saladin. This second kingdom is called the Second Kingdom of Jerusalem or the Kingdom of Acre. Three other crusader states founded during and after the First Crusade were located north, the County of Edessa, the Principality of Antioch. While all three were independent, they were tied to Jerusalem. Beyond these to the north and west lay the states of Armenian Cilicia, further east, various Muslim emirates were located which were ultimately allied with the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad. Jerusalem itself fell to Saladin in 1187, and in the 13th century the kingdom was reduced to a few cities along the Mediterranean coast. In this period, the kingdom was ruled by the Lusignan dynasty of the Kingdom of Cyprus, dynastic ties also strengthened with Tripoli, Antioch, and Armenia. The kingdom was soon dominated by the Italian city-states of Venice and Genoa. Emperor Frederick II claimed the kingdom by marriage, but his presence sparked a war among the kingdoms nobility. The kingdom became more than a pawn in the politics and warfare of the Ayyubid and Mamluk dynasties in Egypt, as well as the Khwarezmian. The Mamluk sultans Baibars and al-Ashraf Khalil eventually reconquered all the remaining crusader strongholds, the kingdom was ethnically, religiously, and linguistically diverse, although the crusaders themselves and their descendants were an elite Catholic minority. They imported many customs and institutions from their homelands in Western Europe, the kingdom also inherited oriental qualities, influenced by the pre-existing customs and populations. The majority of the inhabitants were native Christians, especially Greek and Syrian Orthodox, as well as Sunni. The native Christians and Muslims, who were a lower class, tended to speak Greek and Arabic, while the crusaders spoke French. There were also a number of Jews and Samaritans. According to the Jewish writer Benjamin of Tudela, who travelled through the kingdom around 1170, since sets a lower bound for the Samaritan population at 1,500, since the contemporary Tolidah, a Samaritan chronicle, also mentions communities in Gaza and Acre. The First Crusade was preached at the Council of Clermont in 1095 by Pope Urban II, however, the main objective quickly became the control of the Holy Land

35.
King of Sicily
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See Emirate of Sicily Sicily was granted, pending its Christian reconquest, to Robert Guiscard as duke in 1059 by Pope Nicholas II. The Guiscard granted it as a county to his brother Roger, Roger II received royal investiture from Antipope Anacletus II in 1130 and recognition from Pope Innocent II in 1139. Constance was married to the Emperor Henry VI and he pressed his claim to the kingdom from William IIs death, there is evidence that, during the baronial revolt of 1197, there was an attempt to make Count Jordan Lupin of Bovino king in opposition to Henry VI. He may even have been crowned and seems to have had the support of Constance, in the end he was captured and executed. He is accepted as a pretender to the throne by modern historians Evelyn Jamison, Manfred was regent of Sicily for his nephew, the child Conrad II, but took the crown in 1258, and continued to fight to keep the kingdom under the Hohenstaufen. In 1254 the pope, having declared the kingdom a papal possession, offered the crown to the King of Englands son, Edmund Crouchback, but the English never succeeded in taking the kingdom. In 1262 the pope reversed his previous decision and granted the kingdom to the King of Frances brother, Charles of Anjou, conradin continued his claim to the throne until his death by decapitation perpetrated by Charles of Anjou in 1268. Edmund Crouchback, son of King Henry III of England, claimed the Crown of Sicily between 1254 and 1263, the claim was taken seriously by both him and his father, but was completely ineffectual. Peter III of Aragon, Manfreds son in law, of the House of Barcelona, thereafter the old Kingdom of Sicily was centred on the mainland, with capital at Naples, and although informally called Kingdom of Naples it was still known formally as Kingdom of Sicily. Thus, there were two Sicilies — the island kingdom, however, was often called Sicily beyond the Lighthouse or Trinacria, the Duke of Savoy ceded it to Austria in 1720 by the Treaty of The Hague. Charles I, Duke of Parma conquered the kingdom during the War of the Polish Succession, at the end of the war Sicily was ceded to the new Charles V of Sicily. In 1816 the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of Sicily were merged as the new Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, List of viceroys of Sicily List of Counts of Apulia and Calabria List of monarchs of Naples List of monarchs of the Two Sicilies

36.
Kingdom of Majorca
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The Kingdom of Majorca was founded by James I of Aragon, also known as James The Conqueror. After the death of his firstborn son Alfonso, a will was written in 1262, the Kingdom of Majorca passed to James, who reigned under the name of James II of Majorca. After 1279, Peter III of Aragon established that the king of Majorca was a vassal to the king of Aragon, the title continued to be employed by the Aragonese and Spanish monarchs until its dissolution by the 1715 Nueva Planta decrees. The kingdom included the Balearic Islands, Majorca, Minorca, Ibiza, conscious of the fragility of the Kingdom of Majorca, James I undertook the conquest of Cerdanya to unify the new kingdom. He also entered negotiations to arrange the marriage of his son James to Beatrice of Savoy. On the death of James I, the new king of Majorca, James II, preoccupied with diverse problems within the realm, it was not until 1279 when the Majorcan monarch reconciled to have his states recognized as subordinate to the king of Aragon. As a consequence the Kingdom of Majorca could not hold court, by means of the Treaty of Perpignan in 1279, an imbalance of power between the Kingdom of Aragon and the Kingdom of Majorca was created. This treaty would condition relations between the Kingdom of Majorca and the Crown of Aragon throughout the formers existence, the lack of courts later aggravated the destabilization of a kingdom already on the brink of fracture, which, besides this, lacked any common institution beyond the monarchy. During the Aragonese Crusade, James II of Majorca allied himself with the Pope, as a result, Peters successor Alfonso conquered the kingdom in 1286. However, by the Treaty of Anagni in 1295, James II of Aragon was required to restore the Balearics to James of Majorca. On the death of James II of Majorcas son Sancho in 1324, James III took the throne at the age of nine, the situation was difficult since James II of Aragon did not renounce his claim to the Majorcan throne. While the act solved the problem of succession, it plunged the kingdom into a serious financial crisis. James was forced to develop policies similar to that of Aragons, to that end, he was forced to participate in the war against Genoa, which resulted in the loss of various economic markets for the kingdom. Again, it was necessary to impose new taxes and fines on the Jewish community though this was insufficient to resolve the financial crisis. The problems of the kingdom did not appear to have an end since in 1341, in May 1343, Peter IV invaded the Balearic Islands and followed that in 1344 with the invasions of the counties of Roussillon and Cerdanya. James III was able to only his French possessions. After the sale of these possessions to the king of France in 1349 and he was defeated and killed at the Battle of Llucmajor on 25 October 1349. Then, the Kingdom of Majorca was definitively incorporated into the Crown of Aragon, the kingdom of Majorca, which had bonds of vassalage with the crowns of France and Aragon, could not remain neutral during the conflicts

37.
Corsica
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Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the 13 regions of France. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, southeast of the French mainland, a single chain of mountains make up two-thirds of the island. While being part of France, Corsica is also designated as a territorial collectivity by law, as a territorial collectivity, Corsica enjoys a greater degree of autonomy than other French regions, for example, the Corsican Assembly is able to exercise limited executive powers. The island formed a single department until it was split in 1975 into two departments, Haute-Corse and Corse-du-Sud, with its capital in Ajaccio, the prefecture city of Corse-du-Sud. Bastia, the city of Haute-Corse, is the second-largest settlement in Corsica. After being ruled by the Republic of Genoa since 1284, Corsica was briefly an independent Corsican Republic from 1755 until it was conquered by France in 1769. Due to Corsicas historical ties with the Italian peninsula, the island retains to this day many elements of the culture of Italy, the native Corsican language, whose northern variant is closely related to the Italian language, is recognised as a regional language by the French government. This Mediterranean island was ruled by various nations over the course of history but had several periods of independence. Napoleon was born in 1769 in the Corsican capital of Ajaccio and his ancestral home, Maison Bonaparte, is today used as a museum. The origin of the name Corsica is subject to much debate, to the Ancient Greeks it was known as Kalliste, Corsis, Cyrnos, Cernealis, or Cirné. Of these Cyrnos, Cernealis, or Cirné derive from a corruption of the most ancient Greek name of the island, Σειρηνούσσαι, the claim that latter Greek names are based on the Phoenician word for peninsula are highly unlikely. Corsica has been occupied continuously since the Mesolithic era and it acquired an indigenous population that was influential in the Mediterranean during its long prehistory. The Romans, who built a colony in Aléria, considered Corsica as one of the most backward regions of the Roman world, the island produced sheep, honey, resin and wax, and exported many slaves, not well considered because of their fierce and rebellious character. Moreover, it was known for its wines, exported to Rome. Administratively, the island was divided in pagi, which in the Middle Ages became the pievi, Corsica was integrated by Emperor Diocletian in Roman Italy. In the 5th century, the half of the Roman Empire collapsed, and the island was invaded by the Vandals. Briefly recovered by the Byzantines, it became part of the Kingdom of the Lombards—this made it a dependency of the March of Tuscany. Pepin the Short, king of the Franks and Charlemagnes father, expelled the Lombards, in the first quarter of the 11th century, Pisa and Genoa together freed the island from the threat of Arab invasion

38.
John II of France
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John II, called John the Good, was a monarch of the House of Valois who ruled as King of France from 1350 until his death. While John was a prisoner in London, his son Charles became regent and faced several rebellions, to liberate his father, he concluded the Treaty of Brétigny, by which France lost many territories and paid an enormous ransom. In an exchange of hostages, which included his second son Louis, Duke of Anjou, when John was informed that Louis had escaped from captivity, he voluntarily returned to England, where he died in 1364. He was succeeded by his son Charles V, John was nine years old when his father had himself crowned as Philip VI of France. Initially a marriage with Eleanor of Woodstock, sister of King Edward III of England, was considered, Bohemia had aspirations to control Lombardy and needed French diplomatic support. The military clauses stipulated that, in the event of war, the political clauses ensured that the Lombard crown would not be disputed if the king of Bohemia managed to obtain it. Philip selected Bonne of Bohemia as a wife for his son, as she was closer to child-bearing age, and the dowry was fixed at 120,000 florins. John reached the age of majority,13 years and one day, on 27 April 1332, the wedding was celebrated on 28 July at the church of Notre-Dame in Melun in the presence of six thousand guests. The festivities were prolonged by a two months when the young groom was finally knighted at the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. Upon his accession as Duke of Normandy in 1332, John had to deal with the reality that most of the Norman nobility was already allied with the English camp, effectively, Normandy depended economically more on maritime trade across the English Channel than on river trade on the Seine. The Duchy had not been English for 150 years, but many landowners had holdings across the Channel, consequently, to line up behind one or other sovereign risked confiscation. Therefore, Norman members of the nobility were governed as interdependent clans and it was split into two key camps, the counts of Tancarville and the counts of Harcourt, which had been in conflict for generations. King Philip, worried about the richest area of the breaking into bloodshed, ordered the bailiffs of Bayeux. Geoffroy dHarcourt raised troops against the king, rallying a number of nobles protective of their autonomy, the rebels demanded that Geoffroy be made duke, thus guaranteeing the autonomy granted by the charter. Royal troops took the castle at Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte and Geoffroy was exiled to Brabant, three of his companions were decapitated in Paris on 3 April 1344. In 1342, John was in Avignon at the coronation of Pope Clement VI, by 1345, increasing numbers of Norman rebels had begun to pay homage to Edward III, constituting a major threat to the legitimacy of the Valois kings. The defeat at the Battle of Crécy on 26 August 1346, defections by the nobility, whose land fell within the broad economic influence of England, particularly in the north and west, increased. Consequently, King Philip VI decided to seek a truce, Duke John met Geoffroy dHarcourt, to whom the king agreed to return all confiscated goods, even appointing him sovereign captain in Normandy

39.
Charles VII of France
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Charles VII, called the Victorious or the Well-Served, was a monarch of the House of Valois who ruled as King of France from 1422 to his death. In the midst of the Hundred Years War, Charles VII inherited the throne of France under desperate circumstances, in addition, his father Charles VI had disinherited him in 1420 and recognized Henry V of England and his heirs as the legitimate successors to the French crown instead. At the same time, a war raged in France between the Armagnacs and the Burgundian party. However, his political and military position improved dramatically with the emergence of Joan of Arc as a leader in France. Joan of Arc and other charismatic figures led French troops to lift the siege of Orléans, as well as other cities on the Loire river. With the local English troops dispersed, the people of Reims switched allegiance and opened their gates and this long-awaited event boosted French morale as hostilities with England resumed. Following the battle of Castillon in 1453, the French had expelled the English from all their continental possessions except for the Pale of Calais, the last years of Charles VII were marked by conflicts with his turbulent son, the future Louis XI of France. Born at the Hôtel Saint-Pol, the residence in Paris. He was the child and fifth son of Charles VI of France. His four elder brothers, Charles, Charles, Louis and John had each held the title of Dauphin of France in turn, all died childless, leaving Charles with a rich inheritance of titles. By 1419, Charles had established his own court in Bourges and they also decided that a further meeting should take place the following 10 September. On that date, they met on the bridge at Montereau, the Duke assumed that the meeting would be entirely peaceful and diplomatic, thus he brought only a small escort with him. The Dauphins men reacted to the Dukes arrival by attacking and killing him, Charles level of involvement has remained uncertain to this day. Although he claimed to have been unaware of his mens intentions, the assassination marked the end of any attempt of a reconciliation between the two factions Armagnacs and Burgundians, thus playing into the hands of Henry V of England. Charles was later required by a treaty with Philip the Good, the son of John the Fearless, to pay penance for the murder, at the death of his father, Charles VI, the succession was cast into doubt. For those who did not recognize the treaty and believed the Dauphin Charles to be of legitimate birth, for those who did not recognize his legitimacy, the rightful heir was recognized as Charles, Duke of Orléans, cousin of the Dauphin, who was in English captivity. Only the supporters of Henry VI and the Dauphin Charles were able to enlist sufficient military force to press effectively for their candidates, the English, already in control of northern France, were able to enforce the claim of their king in the regions of France that they occupied. Northern France, including Paris, was ruled by an English regent, Henry Vs brother, John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford

40.
Castle of Angers
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The Château dAngers is a castle in the city of Angers in the Loire Valley, in the département of Maine-et-Loire, in France. Founded in the 9th century by the Counts of Anjou, was expanded to its current size in the 13th century and it is located overhanging the river Maine. Now open to the public, the Château dAngers is home of the Apocalypse Tapestry, originally, this castle was built as a fortress at one of the sites inhabited by the Romans because of its strategic defensive location. In the 9th century, the Bishop of Angers gave the Counts of Anjou permission to build a castle in Angers and it became part of the Angevin empire of the Plantagenet Kings of England during the 12th century. In 1204, the region was conquered by Philip II and a castle was built during the minority of his grandson. The construction undertaken in 1234 cost 4,422 livres, roughly one per cent of the royal revenue at the time. Louis gave the castle to his brother, Charles in 1246, in 1352, King John II le Bon, gave the castle to his second son, Louis who later became count of Anjou. Louis II and Yolande dAragon added a chapel and royal apartments to the complex, the chapel is a sainte chapelle, the name given to churches which enshrined a relic of the Passion. The relic at Angers was a splinter of the fragment of the True Cross which had acquired by Louis IX. In the early 15th century, the dauphin who, with the assistance of Joan of Arc would become King Charles VII, had to flee Paris and was given sanctuary at the Château d Angers. At the end of the 18th century, as a military garrison, unable to do anything else, the invaders simply gave up. A military academy was established in the castle to train officers in the strategies of war. Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, best known for taking part in the defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte at the Battle of Waterloo, was trained at the Military Academy of Angers. The academy was moved to Saumur and the castle was used for the rest of the 19th century as a prison, powder magazine, the castle continued to be used as an armory through the First and Second World Wars. It was severely damaged during World War II by the Nazis when a storage dump inside the castle exploded. On 10 January 2009, the castle suffered damage from an accidental fire due to short-circuiting. The Royal Logis, which contains old tomes and administrative offices, was the most heavily damaged part of the chateau, the Tapestries of the Apocalypse were not damaged. Total damages have been estimated at 2 million Euros, according to Christine Albanel, the Minister of Culture, the expected date of completion for the restoration is the second trimester of 2009

41.
Louis II of Anjou
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Louis II was King of Naples from 1389 until 1399 and Duke of Anjou from 1384 until 1417. He was a member of the House of Valois-Anjou, born in Toulouse, Louis II was the son of Louis I of Anjou, King of Naples, and Marie of Blois. He came into his Angevin inheritance, which included Provence, in 1384, with his rival Charles of Durazzo, of the senior Angevin line, most towns in Provence revolted after the death of his father. His mother then raised an army and they traveled from town to town, Louis was recognized as Count of Provence in 1387. He founded a university in Aix-en-Provence in 1409, in 1386, Charles of Durazzos son, the underage Ladislaus, was expelled from Naples soon after his father died. Louis II was crowned King of Naples by the Avignonese antipope Clement VII on 1 November 1389 and he was ousted in turn by his rival in 1399. In 1409, Louis liberated Rome from Ladislaus occupation, in 1410, as an ally of the antipope John XXIII he attacked Ladislaus, eventually Louis lost his Neapolitan support and had to retire. His claim to Naples passed to his son, Louis III and he married his first cousin once removed Yolande of Aragon in Arles in 1400, giving him a possibility of inheriting the throne of Aragon through her right. Her father, King John I of Aragon had died in 1396 and his son Louis was bethrothed to Catherine of Burgundy, a daughter of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy. However, after John instigated a mob attack on the Dauphin of France, he, the betrothal to Catherine was repudiated, which caused the enmity of the Duke of Burgundy. He was not present at the Battle of Agincourt, because he had a bladder infection, after the battle, he fled from Paris to join his wife and children at Angers. Louis II died at his chateau of Angers, the county town of Anjou, Louis and Yolande had five surviving children, Louis III of Anjou, titular King of Naples, Duke of Anjou. René of Anjou, King of Naples, Duke of Anjou, Charles of Le Maine, Count of Maine. Marie of Anjou, married 1422 at Bourges Charles VII of France, Yolande, married firstly Philip I, Duke of Brabant and secondly in 1431, Francis I, Duke of Brittany. The Good King, René of Anjou and Fifteenth Century Europe

42.
Kingdom of Aragon
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The Kingdom of Aragon was a medieval and early modern kingdom on the Iberian Peninsula, corresponding to the modern-day autonomous community of Aragon, in Spain. The name Aragón is the same as that of the river Aragón and it might derive from the Basque Aragona/Haragona meaning good upper valley. Alternatively, the name may be derived from the earlier Roman province of Hispania Tarraconensis, by defeating his brother, García Sánchez III of Navarre, Ramiro achieved independence for Aragon. His son Sancho Ramírez, who inherited the kingdom of Navarre, was the first to call himself King of the Aragonians. As the Aragonian domains expanded to the south, conquering land from Al Andalus, the city moved from Jaca to Huesca. After Alfonso the Battler died childless in 1135, different rulers were chosen for Navarre and Aragon, by 1285 the southernmost areas of what is nowadays Aragon had been taken from the Moors. The King of Aragón was the direct King of the Aragonese region, and held also the title of Count of Provence, Count of Barcelona, Lord of Montpellier, and Duke of Athens and Neopatria. Each of these gave him sovereignty over a certain region. In the 14th century, his power was restricted by the Union of Aragon. The Crown of Aragon became a part of the Spanish monarchy after the union with Castile. One of Ferdinands successors, John II of Aragon, countered residual Catalan resistance by arranging for his heir, Ferdinand, to marry Isabella, in 1479, upon John II’s death, the crowns of Aragon and Castile were united to form the nucleus of modern Spain. The decrees ended the kingdoms of Aragon, Valencia and Mallorca and the Principality of Catalonia, a new Nueva Planta decree in 1711 restored some rights in Aragon, such as the Aragonese Civil Rights, but preserved the end of the political independence of the kingdom. The old kingdom of Aragon survived as a unit until 1833. In the aftermath of Francisco Francos death, in 1982 Aragon became one of the communities of Spain. List of Aragonese monarchs List of Aragonese consorts List of Navarrese monarchs List of Counts of Barcelona

43.
Marie of Anjou
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Marie of Anjou was Queen of France as the spouse of King Charles VII from 1422 to 1461. She served as regent and presided over the council of several times during the absence of the king. Marie was the eldest daughter of Louis II of Anjou, titular King of Naples, titular King of Sicily, Marie was betrothed to her second cousin Charles, fifth son of Charles VI of France and Isabeau of Bavaria, in 1413. The wedding took place in April 1422 at Bourges, the wedding made her Queen of France, but as far as it is known, she was never crowned. Her spouses victory in the Hundred Years War owed a great deal to the support he received from Maries family, notably from her mother Yolande of Aragon. Queen Marie presided over the Council of state several times in the absence of the king, during which she had power of attorney as regent and she made several pilgrimages, such as Puy with the king in 1424, and Mount St Michel by herself in 1447. Robert Blondel composed the allegorical Treatise of the Twelve Perils of Hell for queen Marie in 1455, in 1461, Charles VII died and was succeeded by their son Louis XI, making Marie queen dowager. She was granted the Chateau of Amboise and the income from Brabant by her son, during the winter of 1462-63, Marie of Anjou made a pilgrimage to St Jacques de Compostela. She died at the age of 59 on 29 November 1463 at the Cistercian Abbaye de Chateliers-en-Poitou on her return and she is buried in the basilica of Saint-Denis alongside her spouse. Marie was the mother of fourteen children

44.
Guise
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Guise is a commune in the Aisne department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. The ruins of the castle of Guise, seat of the Dukes of Guise, are located in the commune. Guise is the centre of the northern area of Aisne. Guise was the birthplace of Camille Desmoulins, a journalist and politician who played an important part in the French Revolution. Over a period of 20 years, beginning about 1856, Jean-Baptiste Godin built Le Familistère and it expressed many of his ideas about developing social sympathy through improved housing and services for workers and their families, influenced by the ideas of the philosopher Charles Fourier. In 1880 Godin created an association by which the workers owned and managed the complex. On the 29th of August 1914 the Battle of St. Quentin was fought in, a memorial in Guise celebrates this event. House of Guise Communes of the Aisne department INSEE

45.
Charles II, Duke of Lorraine
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Charles II, called the Bold was the Duke of Lorraine from 1390 to his death and Constable of France from 1418 to 1425. Charles was the son of John I, Duke of Lorraine. He is called Charles II because of a previous Charles, Duke of Lower Lorraine, despite the fact that his own duchy was that of Upper Lorraine, Lower Lorraine being subsumed in Brabant by his time. During his youth, he had close to Philip II, Duke of Burgundy. Charles was defiant of Louis I, Duke of Orléans, who had supported the citizens of Neufchâteau against his father, Wenceslaus was deposed in 1400 and replaced by Rupert III, Count Palatine of the Rhine, Charles father-in-law. Charles was also a participant in some late Crusading movements. He took part in the so-called Last Crusade which culminated in the disastrous Battle of Nicopolis in 1396, there he accompanied John the Fearless, the count of Nevers and son of his friend Philip. In 1399, he assisted the Teutonic Knights in Livonia, then, in 1407, at the head of a coalition of the dukes of Bar, Luxembourg, and the margraves of Namur he attacked the duchy. Louis was defeated at Corny-sur-Moselle and then, in July, at Champigneulles and his assassination in Paris on 23 November put an end to his plans. Charles did not, however, enter the Anglo-French conflict then raging—the Hundred Years War—but his brother, Frederick I, Count of Vaudémont, nevertheless, the queen, Isabeau of Bavaria, appointed Charles constable in 1418. In 1424, he asserted that the load was too large for him, Charles adopted a new stance vis-à-vis France after the assassination of John the Fearless in 1419. Johns successor, Philip III, had much territory in the Low Countries, fearing any warlike ambitions, Charles thought it prudent to reorient his fidelities and friendships away from such a possible adversary. Through his French connections, he obtained the assistance of Charles VII against Burgundy and married his daughter to the Angevin René, charless final years were rife with conflict and unhappiness. His nephew, Anthony of Vaudémont demanded a part of the inheritance and Charles had to war against him in 1425, early in 1429, Joan of Arc came on a pilgrimage to Saint-Nicolas-de-Port. She counselled the duke to abandon his mistress, Alison du May, ignoring this advice, he gave her an escort and sent her on to Chinon. He died two years later at his capital of Nancy on 21 or 25 January, John Pillelipille, Lord of Darnieulles, married Philippa de Marches. Isabelle, married in 1425 to Henry of Liocourt

46.
Duchy of Lorraine
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The Duchy of Lorraine, originally Upper Lorraine, was a duchy now included in the larger present-day region of Lorraine in northeastern France. It was founded in 959 following the division of Lotharingia into two duchies, Upper and Lower Lorraine, the westernmost parts of the Holy Roman Empire. The Lower duchy was quickly dismantled, while Upper Lorraine came to be known as simply the Duchy of Lorraine, the Duchy of Lorraine was coveted and briefly occupied by the Dukes of Burgundy and the Kings of France. When Stanisław died on 23 February 1766, Lorraine was annexed by France, lorraines predecessor, Lotharingia, was an independent Carolingian kingdom under the rule of King Lothair II. Its territory had originally been a part of Middle Francia, created in 843 by the Treaty of Verdun, Middle Francia was allotted to Emperor Lothair I, therefore called Lotharii Regnum. On his death in 855, it was divided into three parts, of which his son Lothair II took the northern one. His realm then comprised a territory stretching from the County of Burgundy in the south to the North Sea. In French, this became known as Lorraine, while in German. In the Alemannic language once spoken in Lorraine, the -ingen suffix signified a property, thus, in a figurative sense, stuck in the conflict with his rival Hugh the Great, in 942 King Louis IV of France renounced all claims to Lotharingia. In 953, the German king Otto I had appointed his brother Bruno the Great Duke of Lotharingia, in 959, Bruno divided the duchy into Upper and Lower Lorraine, this division became permanent following his death in 965. The Upper Duchy was further up the system, that is, it was inland. Upper Lorraine was first denominated as the Duchy of the Moselle, the usage of Lotharingia Superioris and Lorraine in official documents begins later, around the fifteenth century. The first duke and deputy of Bruno was Frederick I of Bar, Lower Lorraine disintegrated into several smaller territories and only the title of a Duke of Lothier remained, held by Brabant. After the duchy of the Moselle came into the possession of René of Anjou, the name Duchy of Lorraine was adopted again, only retrospectively called Upper Lorraine. At that time, several territories had already split off, such as the County of Luxembourg, the Electorate of Trier, the County of Bar, the border between the Empire and the Kingdom of France remained relatively stable throughout the Middle Ages. In 1301, Count Henry III of Bar had to receive the part of his lands as a fief by King Philip IV of France. In 1475, the Burgundian duke Charles the Bold campaigned for the Duchy of Lorraine, in the 1552 Treaty of Chambord, a number of insurgent Protestant Imperial princes around Elector Maurice of Saxony ceded the Three Bishoprics to King Henry II of France in turn for his support. In the 17th century, the French kings began to covet Lorraine, while the central Imperial authority decayed in the course of the Thirty Years War, Chief Minister Cardinal Richelieu urged the occupation of the duchy in 1641

The historical province of Provence (orange) within the modern region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur in southeast France.

The entrance to the Cosquer Cave, decorated with paintings of auks, bison, seals and outlines of hands dating to 27,000 to 19,000 BC, is located 37 meters under the surface of the Calanque de Morgiou near Cassis.